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{{short description|16th-century English dramatist, poet, and translator}}
<!-- A NOTE TO EDITORS OF THIS PAGE: The Wikipedia strives for neutral point of view and verifiability. Before adding anything to this page, please make sure that it is fully sourced and neutral. Do not add your own personal opinions or speculation. -->
{{two other uses|the English dramatist|the Raymond Chandler film|Marlowe (film)|the American cabaret composer|Christopher Marlowe (composer)}}
{{about|the English dramatist|the American sportscaster|Chris Marlowe}}
{{use British English|date=May 2012}}
{{Infobox Writer <!-- for more information see [[:Template:Infobox Writer/doc]] -->
{{use dmy dates|date=June 2018}}
| name = Christopher Marlowe
<!-- A NOTE TO EDITORS OF THIS PAGE: The Wikipedia strives for neutral point of view and verifiability. Before adding anything to this page, please make sure that it is fully sourced and neutral. Do not add your opinions or speculation. -->
| image = Christopher_Marlowe.jpg
{{Infobox person
| caption = An anonymous portrait in [[Corpus Christi College, Cambridge]], often believed to show Christopher Marlowe.
| name = Christopher Marlowe
| birthdate = baptised [[26 February]] [[1564]]
| image = Christopher Marlowe.jpg
| birthplace = [[Canterbury]], [[England]]
| caption = [[Marlowe portrait|Anonymous portrait]], possibly of Marlowe,<br>at [[Corpus Christi College, Cambridge]]
| deathdate = {{death date|1593|5|30|df=y}}
| deathplace = [[Deptford, London|Deptford]], [[England]]
| birth_place = [[Canterbury]], Kent, England
| baptised = 26 February 1564
| occupation = [[Playwright]], [[poet]]
| death_date = 30 May 1593 (aged 29)
| nationality = [[English people|English]]
| death_place = [[Deptford]], Kent, England
| period = ''circa'' [[1586]] – [[1593]]
| resting_place = [[Deptford St Nicholas|Churchyard of St. Nicholas]], Deptford; unmarked; memorial plaques inside and outside church
| movement = [[English renaissance theatre]]
| alma_mater = [[Corpus Christi College, Cambridge]]
| debut_work = [[Dido, Queen of Carthage]]
| occupation = {{cslist|Playwright|poet}}
| influenced = [[William Shakespeare]]
| era = {{unbulleted list|[[Elizabethan era|Elizabethan]]}}
| signature = KitMarloweSig.JPG }}
| yearsactive = c. mid-1580s – 1593
| movement = [[English Renaissance]]
| notable_works = {{cslist|''[[Hero and Leander (poem)|Hero and Leander]]''|''[[Tamburlaine the Great]]''|''[[Edward II (play)|Edward the Second]]''|''[[Doctor Faustus (play)|The Tragical History of Doctor Faustus]]''|''[[Dido, Queen of Carthage (play)|Dido, Queen of Carthage]]''}}
| signature = Christopher Marlowe Signature.svg
}}


'''Christopher Marlowe''' ({{IPAc-en|ˈ|m|ɑr|l|oʊ}} {{respell|MAR|loh}}; [[Baptism|baptised]] 26 February 1564{{spaced ndash}}30 May 1593), also known as '''Kit Marlowe''', was an English playwright, poet, and translator of the [[Elizabethan era]].{{efn|"Christopher Marlowe was [[Baptism|baptised]] as 'Marlow,' but he spelled his name 'Marley' in his one known surviving signature."<ref name="Kathman 2">{{cite web |last1=Kathman |first1=David |title=The Spelling and Pronunciation of Shakespeare's Name: Pronunciation |url=http://shakespeareauthorship.com/name1.html#3 |website=shakespeareauthorship.com |access-date=14 Jun 2020 |archive-date=27 November 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201127020121/https://shakespeareauthorship.com/name1.html#3 |url-status=live }}</ref>}} Marlowe is among the most famous of the [[English Renaissance theatre|Elizabethan playwrights]]. Based upon the "many imitations" of his play ''[[Tamburlaine]]'', modern scholars consider him to have been the foremost dramatist in London in the years just before his mysterious early death.{{efn|"During Marlowe's lifetime, the popularity of his plays, Robert Greene's unintentionally elevating remarks about him as a dramatist in ''A Groatsworth of Wit'', including the designation 'famous', and the many imitations of ''Tamburlaine'' suggest that he was for a brief time considered England's foremost dramatist." Logan also suggests consulting the business diary of Philip Henslowe, which is traditionally used by theatre historians to determine the popularity of Marlowe's plays.{{sfnp|Logan|2007|pp=4–5, 21}}}} Some scholars also believe that he greatly influenced [[William Shakespeare]], who was baptised in the same year as Marlowe and later succeeded him as the preeminent Elizabethan playwright.{{efn|No birth records, only baptismal records, have been found for Marlowe and Shakespeare, therefore any reference to a birthdate for either man probably refers to the date of their baptism.{{sfnp|Logan|2007|pp=3, 231-235}}}} Marlowe was the first to achieve critical reputation for his use of [[blank verse]], which became the standard for the era. His plays are distinguished by their overreaching protagonists. Themes found within Marlowe's literary works have been noted as [[humanistic]] with realistic emotions, which some scholars find difficult to reconcile with Marlowe's "[[anti-intellectualism]]" and his catering to the prurient tastes of his Elizabethan audiences for generous displays of extreme physical violence, cruelty, and bloodshed.{{sfnp|Wilson|1999|p=3}}
'''Christopher "Kit" Marlowe''' (baptised [[26 February]] [[1564]] &ndash; [[30 May]] [[1593]]) was an [[Kingdom of England|English]] [[Playwright|dramatist]], [[poet]], and [[translator]] of the [[Elizabethan era]]. The foremost [[English Renaissance theatre|Elizabethan]] [[tragedy|tragedian]] before [[William Shakespeare]], he is known for his magnificent [[blank verse]], his overreaching [[protagonist]]s, and his own untimely death.


Events in Marlowe's life were sometimes as extreme as those found in his plays.{{efn|"...as one of the most influential current critics, Stephen Greenblatt frets, Marlowe's 'cruel, aggressive plays' seem to reflect a life also lived on the edge: 'a courting of disaster as reckless as any that he depicted on stage'."{{sfnp|Wilson|1999|p=4}}}} Differing sensational reports of Marlowe's death in 1593 abounded after the event and are contested by scholars today owing to a lack of good documentation. There have been many conjectures as to the nature and reason for his death, including a vicious bar-room fight, [[blasphemous libel]] against the church, homosexual intrigue, betrayal by another playwright, and espionage from the highest level: the [[Privy Council of England|Privy Council]] of [[Elizabeth I]]. An official coroner's account of Marlowe's death was discovered only in 1925,<ref name="rey.myzen.co.uk">{{cite web|url=http://www.rey.myzen.co.uk/inquis~2.htm|title=Peter Farey's Marlowe page|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150622090306/http://www.rey.myzen.co.uk/inquis~2.htm |archive-date=22 June 2015|access-date=30 April 2015}}</ref> and it did little to persuade all scholars that it told the whole story, nor did it eliminate the uncertainties present in his biography.<ref>{{cite journal|last=Erne|first=Lukas|date=August 2005|title=Biography, Mythography, and Criticism: The Life and Works of Christopher Marlowe|journal=Modern Philology|volume=103|number=1|publisher=University of Chicago Press|pages=28–50|doi=10.1086/499177|s2cid=170152766|url=https://archive-ouverte.unige.ch/unige:14485|access-date=1 January 2023|archive-date=3 June 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210603033354/https://archive-ouverte.unige.ch/unige:14485|url-status=live}}</ref>
==Early life==

[[Image:Canterbury - Turm der St. George's Church, in der Marlowe getauft wurde.jpg|thumb|left|Marlowe was christened at St George's Church [[Canterbury]]]]
==Early life==
Christopher Marlowe was christened at St George's Church, Canterbury, on [[26 February]] [[1564]]. He was born to a shoemaker in [[Canterbury]] named John Marlowe and his wife Katherine.<ref>This is commemorated by the name of the town's main theatre, the [[Marlowe Theatre]], and by the town museums. However St George's, the church in which he was christened, was gutted by fire in the [[Baedeker raids]] and was demolished in the post-war period - only the tower is left, at the south end of Canterbury's High Street http://www.digiserve.com/peter/cant-sgm1.htm</ref> Marlowe attended [[The King's School, Canterbury]] (where a house is now named after him) and [[Corpus Christi College, Cambridge]] on a scholarship and received his bachelor of arts degree in [[1584]]. In [[1587]] the university hesitated to award him his master's degree because of a rumour that he had converted to [[Roman Catholic]]ism and intended to go to the English college at Rheims to prepare for the priesthood. However, his degree was awarded on schedule when the [[Privy Council of the United Kingdom|Privy Council]] intervened on his behalf, commending him for his "faithful dealing" and "good service" to [[Elizabeth I of England|the queen]].<ref>For a full transcript, see [http://www.prst17z1.demon.co.uk/pc_cert.htm Peter Farey's Marlowe page]</ref> The nature of Marlowe's service was not specified by the Council, but their letter to the Cambridge authorities has provoked much speculation, notably the theory that Marlowe was operating as a secret agent working for Sir [[Francis Walsingham]]'s intelligence service.<ref>{{cite book
[[File:Canterbury - Turm der St. George's Church, in der Marlowe getauft wurde.jpg|thumb|right|upright=0.9|Marlowe was christened at St George's Church, [[Canterbury]]. The tower, shown here, is all that survived destruction during the [[Baedeker Blitz|Baedeker air raids]] of 1942.]]
| last = Hutchinson
Christopher Marlowe, the second of nine children, and oldest child after the death of his sister Mary in 1568, was born to [[Canterbury]] shoemaker John Marlowe and his wife Katherine, daughter of William Arthur of [[Dover]].<ref name="Nicholl">{{cite ODNB |last1=Nicholl |first1=Charles |title=Oxford Dictionary of National Biography |date=2004 |edition=January 2008 |url=http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/18079 |access-date=10 Jun 2020 |chapter=Marlowe [Marley], Christopher|doi=10.1093/ref:odnb/18079 }}</ref> He was baptised at St George's Church, Canterbury, on 26 February 1564 (1563 in the [[Old Style and New Style dates|old style dates]] in use at the time, which placed the new year on 25 March).<ref name="St. George's">{{cite book |editor1-last=Cowper |editor1-first=Joseph Meadows |title=The register booke of the parish of St. George the Martyr, within the citie of Canterburie, of christenings, marriages and burials. 1538–1800 |date=1891 |publisher=Cross & Jackman |location=Canterbury |page=10 |url=https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/008685594 |access-date=16 June 2020 |archive-date=28 July 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200728144929/https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/008685594 |url-status=live }}</ref> Marlowe's birth was likely to have been a few days before,<ref>{{cite book |last1=Hopkins |first1=L. |title=A Christopher Marlowe Chronology |date=2005 |publisher=Springer |isbn=978-0-230-50304-5 |page=27 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=fSh-DAAAQBAJ&pg=PA27 |language=en |access-date=14 July 2021 |archive-date=4 September 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220904211115/https://books.google.com/books?id=fSh-DAAAQBAJ&pg=PA27 |url-status=live }}</ref><ref name="Rackham2014">{{Cite journal |last=Rackham |first=Oliver |date=2014 |issue=93 |title=The Pseudo-Marlowe Portrait: a wish fulfilled? |authorlink=Oliver Rackham |url=https://www.corpus.cam.ac.uk/sites/default/files/images/Development%20Office/The%20letter/Corpus_Letter_93_2014%20-%20Copy%201.pdf |journal=Corpus Letter |publisher=[[Corpus Christi College, Cambridge]] |pages=32 |access-date=7 June 2021 |archive-date=23 October 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211023162726/https://www.corpus.cam.ac.uk/sites/default/files/images/Development%20Office/The%20letter/Corpus_Letter_93_2014%20-%20Copy%201.pdf |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Hilton |first1=Della |title=Who was Kit Marlowe? : The story of the poet and playwright |date=1977 |publisher=New York : Taplinger Pub. Co. |isbn=978-0-8008-8291-4 |page=1 |url=https://archive.org/details/whowaskitmarlowe00hilt/page/n15/mode/2up}}</ref> making him about two months older than [[William Shakespeare]], who was baptised on 26 April 1564 in [[Stratford-upon-Avon]].<ref name="Holland">{{cite ODNB |last1=Holland |first1=Peter |title=Oxford Dictionary of National Biography |date=2004 |edition=January 2013 |url=http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/25200 |access-date=27 May 2020 |chapter=Shakespeare, William |doi=10.1093/ref:odnb/25200 |archive-date=24 October 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161024235508/http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/25200 |url-status=live }}</ref>
| first = Robert

| authorlink =
By age 14, Marlowe was a pupil at [[The King's School, Canterbury|The King's School]], Canterbury on a scholarship{{efn|The earliest record of Marlowe at The King's School is their payment for his scholarship of 1578/79, but Nicholl notes this was "unusually late" to start as a student and proposes he could have begun school earlier as a "fee-paying pupil".<ref name="Nicholl"/>}} and two years later a student at [[Corpus Christi College, Cambridge]], where he also studied through a scholarship with expectation that he would become an Anglican clergyman.<ref name="Marlowe Guy-Bray Wiggins Lindsey 2014 p. 8">{{cite book | last1=Marlowe | first1=C. | last2=Guy-Bray | first2=S. | last3=Wiggins | first3=M. | last4=Lindsey | first4=R. | title=Edward II Revised | publisher=Bloomsbury Publishing | year=2014 | isbn=978-1-4725-7540-1 | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=vm17AwAAQBAJ&pg=PR8 | access-date=2023-01-19 | page=8}}</ref> Instead, he received his Bachelor of Arts degree in 1584.<ref name="Nicholl"/><ref>{{acad|id=MRLW580C|name=Marlowe, Christopher}}</ref> Marlowe mastered [[Latin language|Latin]] during his schooling, reading and translating the works of [[Ovid]]. In 1587, the university hesitated to award his Master of Arts degree because of a rumour that he intended to go to the [[English College, Douai|English seminary]] at [[Rheims]] in northern [[France]], presumably to prepare for ordination as a [[Roman Catholic]] [[Seminary priest|priest]].<ref name="Nicholl"/> If true, such an action on his part would have been a direct violation of royal edict issued by [[Elizabeth I of England|Queen Elizabeth I]] in 1585 criminalising any attempt by an English citizen to be ordained in the Roman Catholic Church.<ref name="Collinson">{{cite ODNB |last1=Collinson |first1=Patrick |title=Oxford Dictionary of National Biography |date=2004 |edition=January 2012 |url=http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/8636 |access-date=27 May 2020 |chapter=Elizabeth I |doi=10.1093/ref:odnb/8636 |archive-date=19 August 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210819042621/https://www.oxforddnb.com/view/10.1093/ref:odnb/9780198614128.001.0001/odnb-9780198614128-e-8636;jsessionid=4B33E8F1E68F70E307BFE7BBF6367B30 |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=https://history.hanover.edu/texts/ENGref/er85.html |title=Act Against Jesuits and Seminarists (1585), 27 Elizabeth, Cap. 2, ''Documents Illustrative of English Church History'' |publisher=Macmillan (1896) |access-date=27 May 2020 |archive-date=20 September 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200920173546/https://history.hanover.edu/texts/ENGref/er85.html |url-status=live }}</ref>
| coauthors =

| title = Elizabeth's Spy Master: Francis Walsingham and the secret war that saved England
[[St. Bartholomew's Day massacre|Large-scale violence]] between [[Protestants]] and [[Catholics]] on the European continent has been cited by scholars as the impetus for the [[Elizabeth I|Protestant English Queen]]'s defensive [[Elizabethan Religious Settlement|anti-Catholic laws]] issued from 1581 until her death in 1603.<ref name="Collinson"/> Despite the dire implications for Marlowe, his degree was awarded on schedule when the [[Privy Council of England|Privy Council]] intervened on his behalf, commending him for his "faithful dealing" and "good service" to [[Elizabeth I|the Queen]].<ref>For a full transcript, see [http://www.rey.myzen.co.uk/pc_cert.htm Peter Farey's Marlowe page] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161223144200/http://rey.myzen.co.uk/pc_cert.htm |date=23 December 2016 }} (Retrieved 30 April 2015).</ref> The nature of Marlowe's service was not specified by the council, but its letter to the Cambridge authorities has provoked much speculation by modern scholars, notably the theory that Marlowe was operating as a secret agent for Privy Council member Sir [[Francis Walsingham]].<ref>{{cite book |last=Hutchinson |first=Robert |title=Elizabeth's Spy Master: Francis Walsingham and the Secret War that Saved England |publisher=Weidenfeld & Nicolson |year=2006 |location=London |page=111 |isbn =978-0-297-84613-0}}</ref> The only surviving evidence of the Privy Council's correspondence is found in their minutes, the letter being lost. There is no mention of [[espionage]] in the minutes, but its summation of the lost Privy Council letter is vague in meaning, stating that "it was not Her Majesties pleasure" that persons employed as Marlowe had been "in matters touching the benefit of his country should be defamed by those who are ignorant in th'affaires he went about." Scholars agree the vague wording was typically used to protect government agents, but they continue to debate what the "matters touching the benefit of his country" actually were in Marlowe's case and how they affected the 23-year-old writer as he began his literary career in 1587.<ref name="Nicholl"/>
| publisher = Weidenfeld & Nicolson

| date = 2006
==Adult life and legend==
| location = London
Little is known about Marlowe's adult life. All available evidence, other than what can be deduced from his literary works, is found in legal records and other official documents. Writers of fiction and non-fiction have speculated about his professional activities, private life, and character. Marlowe has been described as a spy, a brawler, and a heretic, as well as a "magician", "duellist", "tobacco-user", "counterfeiter" and "[[Rake (character)|rakehell]]". While J. A. Downie and Constance Kuriyama have argued against the more lurid speculations, [[J. B. Steane]] remarked, "it seems absurd to dismiss all of these Elizabethan rumours and accusations as 'the Marlowe myth{{'"}}.{{sfnp|Kuriyama|2002|p={{page needed|date=February 2022}}}}{{sfnp|Downie|Parnell|2000|p={{page needed|date=February 2022}}}}<ref name="steane"/> Much has been written on his brief adult life, including speculation of: his involvement in royally sanctioned espionage; his vocal declaration of [[atheism]]; his (possibly same-sex) sexual interests; and the puzzling circumstances surrounding his death.
| pages = p111

| url =
===Spying===
| doi =
[[File:OldCurtCC.JPG|thumb|left|The corner of Old Court of [[Corpus Christi College, Cambridge]], where Marlowe stayed while a Cambridge student and, possibly, during the time he was recruited as a spy]]
| id =
Marlowe is alleged to have been a government spy.{{sfnp|Honan|2005|p={{page needed|date=February 2022}}}} [[Park Honan]] and [[Charles Nicholl (author)|Charles Nicholl]] speculate that this was the case and suggest that Marlowe's recruitment took place when he was at Cambridge.{{sfnp|Honan|2005|p={{page needed|date=February 2022}}}}{{sfnp|Nicholl|1992|loc="12"}} In 1587, when the Privy Council ordered the University of Cambridge to award Marlowe his degree as Master of Arts, it denied rumours that he intended to go to the English Catholic college in Rheims, saying instead that he had been engaged in unspecified "affaires" on "matters touching the benefit of his country".<ref>This is from a document dated 29 June 1587, from the National Archives – ''Acts of Privy Council''.</ref> Surviving college records from the period also indicate that, in the academic year 1584–1585, Marlowe had had a series of unusually lengthy absences from the university which violated university regulations. Surviving college [[Buttery (shop)|buttery]] accounts, which record student purchases for personal provisions, show that Marlowe began spending lavishly on food and drink during the periods he was in attendance; the amount was more than he could have afforded on his known scholarship income.{{sfnp|Nicholl|1992|p={{page needed|date=February 2022}}}}{{efn|It is known that some poorer students worked as labourers on the Corpus Christi College chapel, then under construction, and were paid by the college with extra food. It has been suggested this may be the reason for the sums noted in Marlowe's entry in the buttery accounts.<ref name="Riggs2004">{{cite book|first=David|last=Riggs|title=The World of Christopher Marlowe|page=65|year=2004a|publisher=Faber|isbn=978-0-571-22159-2}}</ref>}}
| isbn =0 297 84613 2 }}</ref> No direct evidence supports this theory, although Marlowe obviously did serve the government in some capacity.

[[File:Sir Francis Walsingham by John De Critz the Elder.jpg|thumb|right|upright=0.9|Portrait of alleged "spymaster" Sir [[Francis Walsingham]] ''c.'' 1585; attributed to [[John de Critz]]]]
It has been speculated that Marlowe was the "Morley" who was tutor to [[Arbella Stuart]] in 1589.{{efn|He was described by Arbella's guardian, the Countess of Shrewsbury, as having hoped for an annuity of some £40 from Arbella, his being "so much damnified (i.e. having lost this much) by leaving the University."<ref>British Library [[Lansdowne MS.]] 71, f.3.</ref>{{sfnp|Nicholl|1992|pp=340–342}}}} This possibility was first raised in a ''[[Times Literary Supplement]]'' letter by E. St John Brooks in 1937; in a letter to ''[[Notes and Queries]]'', John Baker has added that only Marlowe could have been Arbella's tutor owing to the absence of any other known "Morley" from the period with an MA and not otherwise occupied.<ref>John Baker, letter to ''Notes and Queries'' 44.3 (1997), pp. 367–368</ref> If Marlowe was Arbella's tutor, it might indicate that he was there as a spy, since Arbella, niece of [[Mary, Queen of Scots]], and cousin of James VI of Scotland, later [[James I of England]], was at the time a strong candidate for the [[succession to Elizabeth's throne]].{{sfnp|Kuriyama|2002|p=89}}{{sfnp|Nicholl|1992|p=342}}<ref name="Handover">{{cite book |last1=Handover |first1=P. M. |title=Arbella Stuart, royal lady of Hardwick and cousin to King James |date=1957 |publisher=Eyre & Spottiswoode |location=London}}</ref><ref>[http://www.history.ac.uk/ihr/Focus/Elizabeth/index.html Elizabeth I and James VI and I] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20061214113207/http://www.history.ac.uk/ihr/Focus/Elizabeth/index.html |date=14 December 2006 }}, [http://www.history.ac.uk/ History in Focus] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110908034533/http://www.history.ac.uk/ |date=8 September 2011 }}.</ref> [[Frederick S. Boas]] dismisses the possibility of this identification, based on surviving legal records which document Marlowe's "residence in London between September and December 1589". Marlowe had been party to a fatal quarrel involving his neighbours and the poet [[Thomas Watson (poet)|Thomas Watson]] in [[Norton Folgate]] and was held in [[Newgate Prison]] for a fortnight.{{sfnp|Boas|1953|pp=101ff}} In fact, the quarrel and his arrest occurred on 18 September, he was released on bail on 1 October and he had to attend court, where he was acquitted on 3 December, but there is no record of where he was for the intervening two months.{{sfnp|Kuriyama|2002|p=xvi}}

In 1592 Marlowe was arrested in the English [[Cautionary Towns|garrison town]] of [[Flushing, Netherlands|Flushing]] (Vlissingen) in the Netherlands, for alleged involvement in the [[Counterfeit money|counterfeiting]] of coins, presumably related to the activities of seditious Catholics. He was sent to the Lord Treasurer ([[William Cecil, 1st Baron Burghley|Burghley]]), but no charge or imprisonment resulted.<ref>For a full transcript, see [http://www.rey.myzen.co.uk/flushing.htm Peter Farey's Marlowe page] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160304031527/http://www.rey.myzen.co.uk/flushing.htm |date=4 March 2016 }} (Retrieved 30 April 2015).</ref> This arrest may have disrupted another of Marlowe's spying missions, perhaps by giving the resulting coinage to the Catholic cause. He was to infiltrate the followers of the active Catholic plotter [[William Stanley (Elizabethan)|William Stanley]] and report back to Burghley.{{sfnp|Nicholl|1992|pp=246–248}}

===Philosophy===
[[File:Sir Walter Ralegh by 'H' monogrammist.jpg|thumb|upright=0.9|Sir [[Walter Raleigh]], shown here in 1588, was the alleged centre of the "[[The School of Night|School of Atheism]]" ''c.'' 1592.]]
Marlowe was reputed to be an atheist, which held the dangerous implication of being an enemy of God and, by association, the state.<ref>{{cite book|last=Stanley|first=Thomas|author-link=Thomas Stanley (author)|title=The History of Philosophy 1655–61|publisher=quoted in [[Oxford English Dictionary]]|year=1687}}</ref> With the rise of public fears concerning [[The School of Night]], or "School of Atheism" in the late 16th century, accusations of atheism were closely associated with disloyalty to the Protestant monarchy of England.<ref>{{cite book|last1=Riggs|first1=David|title=The World of Christopher Marlowe|date=2005|publisher=Henry Holt and Co.|isbn=978-0805077551|edition=1st American|page=294|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=hYhWAgAAQBAJ&q=atheism&pg=PP2|access-date=3 November 2015|archive-date=28 February 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220228193647/https://books.google.com/books?id=hYhWAgAAQBAJ&q=atheism&pg=PP2|url-status=live}}</ref>

Some modern historians consider that Marlowe's professed atheism, as with his supposed Catholicism, may have been no more than a sham to further his work as a government spy.{{sfnp|Riggs|2004|p=[https://archive.org/details/cambridgecompani00chen_319/page/n56 38]}} Contemporary evidence comes from Marlowe's accuser in [[Flushing, Netherlands|Flushing]], an informer called [[Richard Baines]]. The governor of Flushing had reported that each of the men had "of malice" accused the other of instigating the counterfeiting and of intending to go over to the Catholic "enemy"; such an action was considered atheistic by the [[Church of England]]. Following Marlowe's arrest in 1593, Baines submitted to the authorities a "note containing the opinion of one Christopher Marly concerning his damnable judgment of religion, and scorn of God's word".<ref>For a full transcript, see [http://www.rey.myzen.co.uk/baines1.htm Peter Farey's Marlowe page] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160304024355/http://www.rey.myzen.co.uk/baines1.htm |date=4 March 2016 }} (Retrieved 30 April 2012).</ref> Baines attributes to Marlowe a total of eighteen items which "scoff at the pretensions of the [[Old Testament|Old]] and [[New Testament]]" such as, "Christ was a bastard and his mother dishonest [unchaste]", "the woman of Samaria and her sister were whores and that Christ knew them dishonestly", "St [[John the Evangelist]] was bedfellow to Christ and leaned always in his bosom" (cf. John 13:23–25) and "that he used him as the sinners of [[Sodom and Gomorrah|Sodom]]".<ref name="steane">{{cite book|last=Steane|first=J. B.|title=Introduction to Christopher Marlowe: The Complete Plays|publisher=Penguin|year=1969 |location=Aylesbury, UK|isbn=978-0-14-043037-0|url-access=registration |url=https://archive.org/details/completeplays0000marl}}</ref> He also implied that Marlowe had Catholic sympathies. Other passages are merely sceptical in tone: "he persuades men to atheism, willing them not to be afraid of [[bugbear]]s and [[hobgoblins]]". The final paragraph of Baines's document reads:

[[File:ThomasHarriot.jpg|left|thumb|upright=0.9|Portrait often claimed to be [[Thomas Harriot]] (1602), which hangs in [[Trinity College, Oxford]]]]
{{Blockquote|These thinges, with many other shall by good & honest witnes be approved to be his opinions and Comon Speeches, and that this Marlowe doth not only hould them himself, but almost into every Company he Cometh he persuades men to Atheism willing them not to be afeard of bugbeares and hobgoblins, and vtterly scorning both god and his ministers as I Richard Baines will Justify & approue both by mine oth and the testimony of many honest men, and almost al men with whome he hath Conversed any time will testify the same, and as I think all men in Cristianity ought to indevor that the mouth of so dangerous a member may be stopped, he saith likewise that he hath quoted a number of Contrarieties oute of the Scripture which he hath giuen to some great men who in Convenient time shalbe named. When these thinges shalbe Called in question the witnes shalbe produced.<ref name="bainesnote">{{cite web|title=The 'Baines Note'|url=http://www.rey.myzen.co.uk/baines1.htm|access-date=30 April 2015|archive-date=4 March 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160304024355/http://www.rey.myzen.co.uk/baines1.htm|url-status=live}}</ref>}}

Similar examples of Marlowe's statements were given by [[Thomas Kyd]] after his imprisonment and possible torture (see above); Kyd and Baines connect Marlowe with mathematician [[Thomas Harriot]]'s and Sir [[Walter Raleigh]]'s circle.<ref name="Peter Farey's Marlowe page"/> Another document claimed about that time that "one Marlowe is able to show more sound reasons for Atheism than any divine in England is able to give to prove divinity, and that ... he hath read the Atheist lecture to Sir Walter Raleigh and others".<ref name="steane"/>{{efn|The so-called 'Remembrances' against Richard Cholmeley.<ref>For a full transcript, see [http://www.rey.myzen.co.uk/chumley1.htm Peter Farey's Marlowe page] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160125220642/http://www.rey.myzen.co.uk/chumley1.htm |date=25 January 2016 }}. (Retrieved 30 April 2015)</ref>}}

Some critics believe that Marlowe sought to disseminate these views in his work and that he identified with his rebellious and iconoclastic protagonists.<ref>Waith, Eugene. ''The Herculean Hero in Marlowe, Chapman, Shakespeare, and Dryden''. Chatto and Windus, London, 1962. The idea is commonplace, though by no means universally accepted.</ref> Plays had to be approved by the [[Master of the Revels]] before they could be performed and the censorship of publications was under the control of the [[Archbishop of Canterbury]]. Presumably these authorities did not consider any of Marlowe's works to be unacceptable other than the ''Amores''.

===Sexuality===
[[File:Hero-und-Leander.jpg|right|thumb|upright=0.8|Title page to 1598 edition of Marlowe's ''[[Hero and Leander (poem)|Hero and Leander]]'']]
It has been claimed that Marlowe was homosexual. Some scholars argue that the identification of an Elizabethan as gay or homosexual in the modern sense is "[[Anachronism|anachronistic]]," saying that for the Elizabethans the terms were more likely to have been applied to homoerotic affections or sexual acts rather than to what we currently understand as a settled sexual orientation or personal role identity.<ref>{{cite book|last=Smith|first=Bruce R.|title=Homosexual desire in Shakespeare's England|publisher=University of Chicago Press|location=Chicago|date= 1995|page=74|isbn=978-0-226-76366-8}}</ref> Other scholars argue that the evidence is inconclusive and that the reports of Marlowe's homosexuality may be rumours produced after his death. Richard Baines reported Marlowe as saying: "all they that love not Tobacco & Boies were fools". [[David Bevington]] and [[Eric C. Rasmussen]] describe Baines's evidence as "unreliable testimony" and "[t]hese and other testimonials need to be discounted for their exaggeration and for their having been produced under legal circumstances we would now regard as a witch-hunt".<ref>Bevington, David, and Eric Rasmussen, eds. ''Doctor Faustus and Other Plays''. Oxford English Drama. Oxford University Press, 1998, pp. viii–ix. {{ISBN|0-19-283445-2}}</ref>

Literary scholar [[J. B. Steane]] considered there to be "no evidence for Marlowe's homosexuality at all".<ref name="steane"/> Other scholars point to the frequency with which Marlowe explores homosexual themes in his writing: in ''[[Hero and Leander (poem)|Hero and Leander]]'', Marlowe writes of the male youth Leander: "in his looks were all that men desire..."<ref>{{cite book |editor-last=White |editor-first=Paul Whitfield |title=Marlowe, History and Sexuality: New Critical Essays on Christopher Marlowe |publisher=AMS Press |location=New York |year=1998 |isbn=978-0-404-62335-7}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |author=Christopher Marlowe |chapter=Hero and Leander |title=The works of Christopher Marlowe |editor=A. H. Bullen |year=1885 |volume=3 |place=London |publisher=John C. Nimmo |pages=88, 157–193 |url=http://www.gutenberg.org/files/21262/21262-h/21262-h.htm |via=[[Project Gutenberg]] |access-date=21 May 2009 |archive-date=21 September 2008 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080921083327/http://www.gutenberg.org/files/21262/21262-h/21262-h.htm |url-status=live }}</ref> ''[[Edward II (play)|Edward the Second]]'' contains the following passage enumerating homosexual relationships:
{{blockquote|<poem>
The mightiest kings have had their minions;
Great [[Alexander the Great|Alexander]] loved [[Hephaestion]],
The conquering [[Hercules]] for [[Hylas]] wept;
And for [[Patroclus]], stern [[Achilles]] drooped.
And not kings only, but the wisest men:
The Roman [[Cicero|Tully]] loved [[Augustus|Octavius]],
Grave [[Socrates]], wild [[Alcibiades]].<ref>{{cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=eGvavCqLW2AC&pg=PA128 |title=The Routledge Anthology of Renaissance Drama |author=Simon Barker, Hilary Hinds |publisher=Routledge |date=2003 |access-date=9 February 2013 |isbn=9780415187343 |archive-date=29 December 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191229075917/https://books.google.com/books?id=eGvavCqLW2AC&pg=PA128 |url-status=live }}</ref>
</poem>
}}

Marlowe wrote the only [[Edward II (play)|play]] about the life of [[Edward II]] up to his time, taking the [[Renaissance humanism|humanist]] literary discussion of male sexuality much further than his contemporaries. The play was extremely bold, dealing with a star-crossed love story between Edward II and [[Piers Gaveston, 1st Earl of Cornwall|Piers Gaveston]]. Though it was a common practice at the time to reveal characters as homosexual to give audiences reason to suspect them as culprits in a crime, Christopher Marlowe's Edward II is portrayed as a sympathetic character.<ref>{{Cite book|title = Edward the Second|url = https://books.google.com/books?id=axTzkFP9IHoC|publisher = Manchester University Press|date = 1995|isbn = 9780719030895|first1 = Christopher|last1 = Marlowe|first2 = Charles R.|last2 = Forker|access-date = 4 November 2015|archive-date = 21 May 2016|archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20160521190848/https://books.google.com/books?id=axTzkFP9IHoC|url-status = live}}</ref> The decision to start the play ''[[Dido, Queen of Carthage (play)|Dido, Queen of Carthage]]'' with a homoerotic scene between [[Jupiter (mythology)|Jupiter]] and [[Ganymede (mythology)|Ganymede]] that bears no connection to the subsequent plot has long puzzled scholars.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Williams|first=Deanne|date=2006|title=Dido, Queen of England|journal=ELH|volume=73|issue=1|pages=31–59|doi=10.1353/elh.2006.0010|jstor=30030002|s2cid=153554373}}</ref>

===Arrest and death===
[[File:marlowe.jpg|thumb|Marlowe was buried in an unmarked grave in the churchyard of St Nicholas, [[Deptford]]. This modern plaque is on the east wall of the churchyard.]]
In early May 1593, several bills were posted about London threatening the Protestant refugees from France and the Netherlands who had settled in the city. One of these, the "Dutch church libel", written in rhymed [[iambic pentameter]], contained allusions to several of Marlowe's plays and was signed, "[[Tamburlaine]]".<ref>For a full transcript, see [http://www.rey.myzen.co.uk/libell.htm Peter Farey's Marlowe page] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150622092454/http://www.rey.myzen.co.uk/libell.htm |date=22 June 2015 }} (Retrieved 31 March 2012).</ref> On 11 May 1593 the [[Privy Council of the United Kingdom|Privy Council]] ordered the arrest of those responsible for the libels. The next day, Marlowe's colleague [[Thomas Kyd]] was arrested, his lodgings were searched and a three-page fragment of a [[heresy|heretical]] tract was found. In a letter to Sir [[John Puckering]], Kyd asserted that it had belonged to Marlowe, with whom he had been writing "in one chamber" some two years earlier.<ref name="Peter Farey's Marlowe page">For a full transcript of Kyd's letter, see [http://www.rey.myzen.co.uk/kyd2.htm Peter Farey's Marlowe page] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150622085958/http://www.rey.myzen.co.uk/kyd2.htm |date=22 June 2015 }} (Retrieved 30 April 2015).</ref>{{efn|J. R. Mulryne states in {{clarify|text=his ''ODNB'' article|date=February 2022}} that the document was identified in the 20th century as transcripts from John Proctour's ''The Fall of the Late Arian'' (1549).{{citation needed|date=February 2022}}}} In a second letter, Kyd described Marlowe as blasphemous, disorderly, holding treasonous opinions, being an irreligious reprobate and "intemperate & of a cruel hart".<ref name=ODNB/> They had both been working for an [[Aristocracy (class)|aristocratic]] patron, probably [[Ferdinando Stanley, 5th Earl of Derby|Ferdinando Stanley]], Lord Strange.<ref name=ODNB>Mulryne, J. R. [https://www.oxforddnb.com/search?q=Thomas+Kyd&searchBtn=Search&isQuickSearch=true "Thomas Kyd."]''[[Oxford Dictionary of National Biography]]''. Oxford: [[Oxford University Press]], 2004.{{subscription required}} {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220904211123/https://www.oxforddnb.com/search?q=Thomas+Kyd&searchBtn=Search&isQuickSearch=true |date=4 September 2022 }}</ref> A warrant for Marlowe's arrest was issued on 18 May 1593, when the Privy Council apparently knew that he might be found staying with [[Thomas Walsingham (literary patron)|Thomas Walsingham]], whose father was a first cousin of the late Sir [[Francis Walsingham]], Elizabeth's [[Secretary of State (England)|principal secretary]] in the 1580s and a man more deeply involved in state espionage than any other member of the Privy Council.<ref>Haynes, Alan. ''The Elizabethan Secret Service''. London: Sutton, 2005.</ref> Marlowe duly presented himself on 20 May 1593 but there apparently being no Privy Council meeting on that day, was instructed to "give his daily attendance on their Lordships, until he shall be licensed to the contrary".<ref>National Archives, ''Acts of the Privy Council''. Meetings of the Privy Council, including details of those attending, are recorded and minuted for 16, 23, 25, 29 and the morning of 31 May 1593 , all of them taking place in the Star Chamber at Westminster. There is no record of any meeting on either 18 or 20 May 1593, however, just a note of the warrant being issued on 18 May 1593 and the fact that Marlowe "entered his appearance for his indemnity therein" on the 20th.</ref> On Wednesday, 30 May 1593, Marlowe was killed.

[[File:Palladis Tamia 1598.jpg|thumb|left|upright=0.8|Title page to the 1598 edition of ''[[Palladis Tamia]]'' by [[Francis Meres]], which contains one of the earliest descriptions of Marlowe's death]]
Various accounts of Marlowe's death were current over the next few years. In his ''[[Palladis Tamia]]'', published in 1598, [[Francis Meres]] says Marlowe was "stabbed to death by a bawdy serving-man, a rival of his in his lewd love" as punishment for his "[[Epicureanism|epicurism]] and atheism".<ref>''Palladis Tamia''. London, 1598: 286v–287r.</ref> In 1917, in the ''[[Dictionary of National Biography]]'', Sir [[Sidney Lee]] wrote, on slender evidence, that Marlowe was killed in a drunken fight. His claim was not much at variance with the official account, which came to light only in 1925, when the scholar [[Leslie Hotson]] discovered the [[coroner]]'s report of the inquest on Marlowe's death, held two days later on Friday 1 June 1593, by the [[Coroner of the Queen's Household]], [[William Danby (coroner)|William Danby]].<ref name="rey.myzen.co.uk"/> Marlowe had spent all day in a house in [[Deptford, London|Deptford]], owned by the widow [[Eleanor Bull]], with three men: [[Ingram Frizer]], [[Nicholas Skeres]] and [[Robert Poley]]. All three had been employed by one or other of the Walsinghams. Skeres and Poley had helped snare the conspirators in the [[Babington plot]], and Frizer was a servant{{sfnmp|Kuriyama|2002|1pp=102–103, 135, 156|Honan|2005|2p=355}} to Thomas Walsingham, probably acting as a financial or business agent, as he was for Walsingham's wife [[Audrey Walsingham|Audrey]] a few years later.{{sfnp|Hotson|1925|p=65}}{{sfnp|Honan|2005|p=325}} These witnesses testified that Frizer and Marlowe had argued over payment of the bill (now famously known as the "Reckoning"), exchanging "divers malicious words", while Frizer was sitting at a table between the other two and Marlowe was lying behind him on a couch. Marlowe snatched Frizer's dagger and wounded him on the head. According to the coroner's report, in the ensuing struggle Marlowe was stabbed above the right eye, killing him instantly. The jury concluded that Frizer acted in self-defence and within a month he was pardoned. Marlowe was buried in an unmarked grave in the churchyard of St. Nicholas, Deptford, immediately after the inquest, on 1 June 1593.<ref>Wilson, Scott. ''Resting Places: The Burial Sites of More Than 14,000 Famous Persons'', 3d ed.: 2 (Kindle Location 30125). McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers.</ref>

The complete text of the inquest report was published by Leslie Hotson in his book, ''The Death of Christopher Marlowe'', in the introduction to which Professor [[George Lyman Kittredge]] wrote: "The mystery of Marlowe's death, heretofore involved in a cloud of contradictory gossip and irresponsible guess-work, is now cleared up for good and all on the authority of public records of complete authenticity and gratifying fullness". However, this confidence proved to be fairly short-lived. Hotson had considered the possibility that the witnesses had "concocted a lying account of Marlowe's behaviour, to which they swore at the inquest, and with which they deceived the jury", but decided against that scenario.{{sfnp|Hotson|1925|pp=39–40}} Others began to suspect that this theory was indeed the case. Writing to the ''Times Literary Supplement'' shortly after the book's publication, Eugénie de Kalb disputed that the struggle and outcome as described were even possible, and [[Samuel A. Tannenbaum]] insisted the following year that such a wound could not have possibly resulted in instant death, as had been claimed.<ref name="de Kalb">de Kalb, Eugénie (May 1925). "The Death of Marlowe", in ''The Times Literary Supplement''</ref>{{sfnp|Tannenbaum|1926|pp=41–42}} Even Marlowe's biographer John Bakeless acknowledged that "some scholars have been inclined to question the truthfulness of the coroner's report. There is something queer about the whole episode", and said that Hotson's discovery "raises almost as many questions as it answers".<ref>Bakeless, John (1942). ''The Tragicall History of Christopher Marlowe'', p. 182</ref> It has also been discovered more recently that the apparent absence of a local county coroner to accompany the Coroner of the Queen's Household would, if noticed, have made the inquest null and void.{{sfnp|Honan|2005|p=354}}

One of the main reasons for doubting the truth of the inquest concerns the reliability of Marlowe's companions as witnesses.<ref>Nicholl, Charles (2004). "Marlowe [Marley], Christopher", ''Oxford Dictionary of National Biography'', Oxford University Press. [http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/18079 online edn], January 2008. Retrieved 24 August 2013. "The authenticity of the inquest is not in doubt, but whether it tells the full truth is another matter. The nature of Marlowe's companions raises questions about their reliability as witnesses."</ref> As an ''agent provocateur'' for the late Sir Francis Walsingham, Robert Poley was a consummate liar, the "very genius of the Elizabethan underworld", and was on record as saying "I will swear and forswear myself, rather than I will accuse myself to do me any harm".{{sfnp|Boas|1953|p=293}}{{sfnp|Nicholl|2002|p=38}} The other witness, Nicholas Skeres, had for many years acted as a [[confidence trickster]], drawing young men into the clutches of people involved in the [[loanshark|money-lending]] racket, including Marlowe's apparent killer, Ingram Frizer, with whom he was engaged in such a swindle.{{sfnp|Nicholl|2002 |pp=29–30}} Despite their being referred to as ''generosi'' (gentlemen) in the inquest report, the witnesses were professional liars. Some biographers, such as Kuriyama and Downie, take the inquest to be a true account of what occurred, but in trying to explain what really happened if the account was not true, others have come up with a variety of murder theories:{{sfnp|Kuriyama|2002|p=136}}<ref>{{harvc|last=Downie |first=J. A. |c=Marlowe, facts and fictions |in1=Downie |in2=Parnell |year=2000 |pages=26–27}}</ref>
* Jealous of her husband Thomas's relationship with Marlowe, Audrey Walsingham arranged for the playwright to be murdered.<ref name="de Kalb"/>
* Sir Walter Raleigh arranged the murder, fearing that under torture Marlowe might incriminate him.{{sfnp|Tannenbaum|1926|p={{page needed|date=February 2022}}}}
* With Skeres the main player, the murder resulted from attempts by the [[Robert Devereux, 2nd Earl of Essex|Earl of Essex]] to use Marlowe to incriminate Sir Walter Raleigh.{{sfnp|Nicholl|2002|p=415}}
* He was killed on the orders of father and son Lord Burghley and [[Robert Cecil, 1st Earl of Salisbury|Sir Robert Cecil]], who thought that his plays contained Catholic propaganda.<ref>Breight, Curtis C. (1996). '' Surveillance, Militarism and Drama in the Elizabethan Era'', p. 114</ref>
* He was accidentally killed while Frizer and Skeres were pressuring him to pay back money he owed them.<ref>Hammer, Paul E. J. (1996) "A Reckoning Reframed: the 'Murder' of Christopher Marlowe Revisited", in ''English Literary Renaissance'', pp. 225–242</ref>
* Marlowe was murdered at the behest of several members of the Privy Council, who feared that he might reveal them to be atheists.<ref>Trow, M. J. (2001). ''Who Killed Kit Marlowe? A contract to murder in Elizabethan England'', p. 250</ref>
* The Queen ordered his assassination because of his subversive atheistic behaviour.<ref>{{cite book|last=Riggs|first=David|year=2004a|title=The World of Christopher Marlowe|pages=334–337|publisher=Faber|isbn=978-0-571-22159-2}}</ref>
* Frizer murdered him because he envied Marlowe's close relationship with his master Thomas Walsingham and feared the effect that Marlowe's behaviour might have on Walsingham's reputation.{{sfnp|Honan|2005|p=348}}
* Marlowe's [[Marlovian theory of Shakespeare authorship|death was faked]] to save him from trial and execution for subversive atheism.{{efn|"Useful research has been stimulated by the infinitesimally thin possibility that Marlowe did not die when we think he did. ... History holds its doors open."{{sfnp|Honan|2005|p=355}}}}

Since there are only written documents on which to base any conclusions, and since it is probable that the most crucial information about his death was never committed to paper, it is unlikely that the full circumstances of Marlowe's death will ever be known.

==Reputation among contemporary writers==
{{more citations needed section|date=November 2021}}
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For his contemporaries in the literary world, Marlowe was above all an admired and influential artist. Within weeks of his death, [[George Peele]] remembered him as "Marley, the Muses' darling"; [[Michael Drayton]] noted that he "Had in him those brave translunary things / That the first poets had" and [[Ben Jonson]] even wrote of "Marlowe's mighty line".<ref>{{Cite book |last=Nicholl |first=Charles |title=Oxford Dictionary of National Biography |publisher=Oxford University Press |year=2008 |chapter=Marlowe [Marley], Christopher (bap. 1564, . 1593), playwright and poet}}</ref> [[Thomas Nashe]] wrote warmly of his friend, "poor deceased Kit Marlowe," as did the publisher Edward Blount in his dedication of ''Hero and Leander'' to Sir Thomas Walsingham. Among the few contemporary dramatists to say anything negative about Marlowe was the anonymous author of the Cambridge University play ''[[Parnassus plays|The Return from Parnassus]]'' (1598) who wrote, "Pity it is that wit so ill should dwell, / Wit lent from heaven, but vices sent from hell".

The most famous tribute to Marlowe was paid by [[Shakespeare]] in ''[[As You Like It]]'', where he not only quotes a line from ''[[Hero and Leander (poem)|Hero and Leander]]'' ("Dead Shepherd, now I find thy saw of might, 'Who ever lov'd that lov'd not at first sight?{{'"}}) but also gives to the clown [[Touchstone (As You Like It)|Touchstone]] the words "When a man's verses cannot be understood, nor a man's good wit seconded with the forward child, understanding, it strikes a man more dead than a great reckoning in a little room."<ref>Peter Alexander ed., ''William Shakespeare: The Complete Works'' (London 1962) p. 273</ref> This appears to be a reference to Marlowe's murder which involved a fight over the "reckoning," the bill, as well as to a line in Marlowe's ''[[Jew of Malta]]'', "Infinite riches in a little room."

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Shakespeare was much influenced by Marlowe in his work, as can be seen in the use of Marlovian themes in ''[[Antony and Cleopatra]]'', ''[[The Merchant of Venice]]'', ''[[Richard II (play)|Richard II]]'' and ''[[Macbeth]]'' (''Dido'', ''Jew of Malta'', ''Edward II'' and ''Doctor Faustus'', respectively). In ''[[Hamlet]]'', after meeting with the travelling actors, Hamlet requests the Player perform a speech about the Trojan War, which at 2.2.429–432 has an echo of Marlowe's ''[[Dido, Queen of Carthage (play)|Dido, Queen of Carthage]]''. In ''[[Love's Labour's Lost]]'' Shakespeare brings on a character "Marcade" (three syllables) in conscious acknowledgement of Marlowe's character "Mercury", also attending the King of Navarre, in ''Massacre at Paris''. The significance, to those of Shakespeare's audience who were familiar with ''Hero and Leander'', was Marlowe's identification of himself with the god [[Mercury (mythology)|Mercury]].<ref name="Jean-Christophe Mayer2008">{{cite book|last=Wilson|first=Richard|author-link=Richard Wilson (scholar)|editor=Mayer, Jean-Christophe |title=Representing France and the French in early modern English drama|year=2008|publisher=University of Delaware Press|location=Newark|isbn=978-0-87413-000-3|pages=95–97|chapter=Worthies away: the scene begins to cloud in Shakespeare's Navarre}}</ref>

==Shakespeare authorship theory==
{{Main|Marlovian theory of Shakespeare authorship|Shakespeare authorship question}}
An argument has arisen about the notion that Marlowe faked his death and then continued to write under the assumed name of William Shakespeare. Academic consensus rejects alternative candidates for authorship of Shakespeare's plays and sonnets, including Marlowe.<ref>Kathman, David (2003), "The Question of Authorship", in Wells, Stanley; Orlin, Lena C., ''Shakespeare: an Oxford Guide'', Oxford University Press, pp. 620–632, {{ISBN|978-0-19-924522-2}}</ref>


==Literary career==
==Literary career==
{{more citations needed section|date=May 2017}}


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''[[Dido, Queen of Carthage]]'' is Marlowe's first drama, co-written with [[Thomas Kyd]].
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===Plays===
Marlowe's first play performed onstage in [[London]] stage was ''[[Tamburlaine (play)|Tamburlaine]]'' ([[1587]]) about the conqueror [[Timur]], who rises from shepherd to warrior. It is among the first English plays in [[blank verse]], and, with Thomas Kyd's ''[[The Spanish Tragedy]]'', generally is considered the beginning of the mature phase of the [[Elizabethan theatre]]. ''Tamburlaine'' was a success, and was followed with ''Tamburlaine Part II''. The sequence of his plays is unknown; all deal with controversial themes.
Six dramas have been attributed to the authorship of Christopher Marlowe either alone or in collaboration with other writers, with varying degrees of evidence. The writing sequence or chronology of these plays is mostly unknown and is offered here with any dates and evidence known. Among the little available information we have, ''Dido'' is believed to be the first Marlowe play performed, while it was ''Tamburlaine'' that was first to be performed on a regular commercial stage in London in 1587. Believed by many scholars to be Marlowe's greatest success, ''Tamburlaine'' was the first English play written in [[blank verse]] and, with [[Thomas Kyd]]'s ''[[The Spanish Tragedy]]'', is generally considered the beginning of the mature phase of the [[Elizabethan theatre]].<ref name=":N">{{cite web|title=The Sixteenth Century: Topics |url=http://www.wwnorton.com/college/english/nael/16century/topic_1/welcome.htm |postscript=. See especially the middle section in which the author shows how another Cambridge graduate, Thomas Preston makes his title character express his love in a popular play written around 1560 and compares that "clumsy" line with ''Doctor Faustus'' addressing Helen of Troy |work=The Norton Anthology of English Literature |publisher=W.W. Norton and Company |access-date=10 December 2011 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111010193423/http://www.wwnorton.com/college/english/nael/16century/topic_1/welcome.htm |archive-date=2011-10-10 |url-status=deviated}}</ref>


The play ''[[Lust's Dominion]]'' was attributed to Marlowe upon its initial publication in 1657, though scholars and critics have almost unanimously rejected the attribution. He may also have written or co-written ''[[Arden of Faversham]]''.
''[[The Jew of Malta]]'', about a Maltese Jew's barbarous revenge against the city authorities, has a prologue delivered by a character representing [[Niccolò Machiavelli|Machiavelli]]. The protagonist, Barabas is sympathetic, while the Christians are unsympathetic; in his continual plotting and script writing, Barabas often is likened to Marlowe, himself. {{Fact|date=December 2007}}


{{CSS image crop
''[[Edward II (play)|Edward the Second]]'' is an English history play about the deposition of the homosexual King [[Edward II of England|Edward II]] by his barons and the Queen of France.
|Image = Fernando Stanley.jpg
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|Description = [[Ferdinando Stanley, 5th Earl of Derby]], aka "Ferdinando, Lord Straunge," was patron of some of Marlowe's early plays as performed by [[Lord Strange's Men]].
}}


===Poetry and translations===
''[[The Massacre at Paris]]'' is short (believed a memorial construction by actors) portraying the events of the [[Saint Bartholomew's Day Massacre]] in 1572, which English Protestants invoked as the blackest example of Catholic treachery. It features the silent "English Agent" (rumoured to be Marlowe and his connection to the secret service). Along with ''The Tragical History of Doctor Faustus'', ''The Massacre at Paris'' is believed his most dangerous play, as it is about regnant monarchs and politicians (then a treasonable action), and, indeed, addressing [[Elizabeth I]] in its last scene.
Publication and responses to the poetry and translations credited to Marlowe primarily occurred posthumously, including:
* ''[[Amores (Ovid)|Amores]]'', first book of Latin [[elegiac couplet]]s by Ovid with translation by Marlowe (''c''. 1580s); copies publicly burned as offensive in 1599.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Steinhoff |first=Eirik |date=2010 |title=On Christopher Marlowe's 'All Ovids Elegies' |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/23065705 |journal=Chicago Review |volume=55 |issue=3/4 |pages=239–241 |jstor=23065705 |access-date=13 November 2022 |archive-date=13 November 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221113211928/https://www.jstor.org/stable/23065705 |url-status=live }}</ref>
* ''[[The Passionate Shepherd to His Love]]'', by Marlowe. (''c.'' 1587–1588);{{sfnp|Cheney|2004a|p=xvi}} a popular lyric of the time.
* ''[[Hero and Leander (poem)|Hero and Leander]]'', by Marlowe (''c.'' 1593, unfinished; completed by [[George Chapman]], 1598; printed 1598).{{sfnp|Cheney|2004a|pp=xviii, xix}}
* ''[[Pharsalia]]'', Book One, by [[Lucan]] with translation by Marlowe. (''c.'' 1593; printed 1600){{sfnp|Cheney|2004a|pp=xviii, xix}}


===Collaborations===
''[[The Tragical History of Doctor Faustus]]'', based on the German [[Faustbuch]], was the first dramatised version of the [[Faust]] legend of a scholar's dealing with the devil. Whilst versions of "The Devil's Pact" can be traced back to the 4th century, Marlowe deviates significantly by having his hero unable to "burn his books" or have his contract repudiated by a merciful god at the end of the play. Marlowe's protagonist is instead torn apart by demons and dragged off screaming to hell. Dr Faustus is a textual problem for scholars as it was highly edited (and possibly censored) and rewritten after Marlowe's death. Two versions of the play exist: the 1604 [[quarto]], also known as the A text, and the 1616 quarto or B text. Many scholars believe that the A text is more representative of Marlowe's original because it contains irregular character names and idiosyncratic spelling: the hallmarks of a text that used the author's handwritten manuscript, or "[[foul papers]]," as a major source.
Modern scholars still look for evidence of collaborations between Marlowe and other writers. In 2016, one publisher was the first to endorse the scholarly claim of a collaboration between Marlowe and the playwright William Shakespeare:
* ''[[Henry VI, Part 1|Henry VI]]'' by William Shakespeare is now credited as a collaboration with Marlowe in the [[The Oxford Shakespeare|New Oxford Shakespeare]] series, published in 2016. Marlowe appears as co-author of the three ''Henry VI'' plays, though some scholars doubt any actual collaboration.<ref>{{cite news|last1=Shea|first1=Christopher D.|title=New Oxford Shakespeare Edition Credits Christopher Marlowe as a Co-author|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/25/books/shakespeare-christopher-marlowe-henry-vi.html |archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/archive/20220101/https://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/25/books/shakespeare-christopher-marlowe-henry-vi.html |archive-date=2022-01-01 |url-access=limited|access-date=24 October 2016|work=The New York Times|date=24 October 2016}}{{cbignore}}</ref><ref name="cowrite">{{cite news|title=Christopher Marlowe credited as Shakespeare's co-writer|url=https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-37750558|access-date=24 October 2016|publisher=BBC|date=24 October 2016|archive-date=25 October 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161025055153/http://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-37750558|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|last=Freebury-Jones|first=Darren|date=|title=Augean Stables; Or, the State of Modern Authorship Attribution Studies|url=https://www.archivdigital.info/ce/augean-stables-or-the-state-of-modern-authorship-attribution-studies/detail.html|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200723141523/https://www.archivdigital.info/ce/augean-stables-or-the-state-of-modern-authorship-attribution-studies/detail.html |archive-date=23 July 2020 |access-date=2021-01-23|website=www.archivdigital.info}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal|last=Freebury-Jones|first=Darren|date=2017-07-03|title=Did Shakespeare Really Co-Write 2 Henry VI with Marlowe?|url=https://doi.org/10.1080/0895769X.2017.1295360|journal=ANQ: A Quarterly Journal of Short Articles, Notes and Reviews|volume=30|issue=3|pages=137–141|doi=10.1080/0895769X.2017.1295360|s2cid=164545629|issn=0895-769X}}</ref>


[[File:Charles Howard, 1st Earl of Nottingham Procession Portrait detail.jpg|thumb|right|upright=0.9|[[Charles Howard, 1st Earl of Nottingham]], Lord High Admiral, shown here ''c.'' 1601 in a procession for [[Elizabeth I of England]], was patron of the [[Admiral's Men]] during Marlowe's lifetime.]]
Marlowe's plays were enormously successful, thanks in part, no doubt, to the imposing stage presence of [[Edward Alleyn]]. He was unusually tall for the time, and the haughty roles of Tamburlaine, Faustus, and Barabas were probably written especially for him. Marlowe's plays were the foundation of the repertoire of Alleyn's company, the [[Admiral's Men]], throughout the 1590s.


===Contemporary reception===
Marlowe also wrote poetry, including a, possibly, unfinished minor epic, ''[[Hero and Leander (Marlowe's poem)|Hero and Leander]]'' (published with a continuation by [[George Chapman]] in [[1598]]), the popular lyric ''[[The Passionate Shepherd to His Love]]'', and translations of [[Ovid]]'s ''[[Amores]]'' and the first book of [[Lucan (poet)|Lucan]]'s ''[[Pharsalia]]''.
{{more citations needed section|date=February 2021}}
Marlowe's plays were enormously successful, possibly because of the imposing stage presence of his lead actor, [[Edward Alleyn]]. Alleyn was unusually tall for the time and the haughty roles of Tamburlaine, Faustus and Barabas were probably written for him. Marlowe's plays were the foundation of the repertoire of Alleyn's company, the [[Admiral's Men]], throughout the 1590s. One of Marlowe's poetry translations did not fare as well. In 1599, Marlowe's translation of [[Ovid]] was banned and copies were publicly burned as part of [[John Whitgift|Archbishop Whitgift]]'s crackdown on offensive material.


==Chronology of dramatic works==
The two parts of ''[[Tamburlaine (play)|Tamburlaine]]'' were published in 1590; all Marlowe's other works were published posthumously. In [[1599]], his translation of [[Ovid]] was banned and copies publicly burned as part of [[John Whitgift|Archbishop Whitgift]]'s crackdown on offensive material.


(Patrick Cheney's 2004 ''Cambridge Companion to Christopher Marlowe'' presents an alternative timeline based upon printing dates.){{sfnp|Cheney|2004b|p=5}}
==The Marlowe legend==
[[Image:marlowe theatre1.jpg|thumb|right|200px|Marlowe Theatre, [[Canterbury]]]]
As with other writers of the period, little is known about Marlowe. Most of the evidence is legal records and other official documents that tell us little about him. This has not stopped writers of both fiction and non-fiction from speculating about his activities and character. Marlowe has often been described as a spy, a brawler, a heretic, and a homosexual, as well as a "magician", "duelist", "tobacco-user", "counterfeiter", and "[[Rake (character)|rakehell]]". The evidence for most of these claims is slight. The bare facts of Marlowe's life have been embellished by many writers into colourful, and often fanciful, narratives of the Elizabethan underworld.


===''Dido, Queen of Carthage'' ({{circa|1585}}–1587)===
===Spying===
[[File:Dido1594titlepage.jpg|thumb|right|upright=0.70|Title page of the 1594 first edition of ''[[Dido, Queen of Carthage (play)|Dido, Queen of Carthage]]'']]
Marlowe is often alleged to have been a government spy.


'''First official record''' 1594
====Possible evidence of spying====


'''First published''' 1594; posthumously
As noted above, in [[1587]] the [[Privy Council]] ordered Cambridge University to award Marlowe his MA, denying rumours that he intended to go to the English Catholic college in Rheims, saying instead that he had been engaged in unspecified "affaires" on "matters touching the benefit of his country". This from a document dated June 29th, 1587, from the Public Records Office - ''Acts of Privy Council.''


'''First recorded performance''' between 1587 and 1593 by the [[Children of the Chapel]], a company of boy actors in London.<ref>Logan, Terence P., and Denzell S. Smith, eds. ''The Predecessors of Shakespeare: A Survey and Bibliography of Recent Studies in English Renaissance Drama.'' Lincoln, NE: University of Nebraska Press, 1973.</ref>
It has sometimes been theorized that Marlowe was the "Morley" who was tutor to [[Arbella Stuart]] in [[1589]], described by Arbella's guardian, the Countess of Shrewsbury, as having hoped for an annuity of some £40 from Arbella, his being "so much damnified (i.e. having lost this much) by leaving the University".<ref>BL Lansdowne MS 71,f.3.and Charles Nicholl, ''The Reckoning'' (1992), pp. 340-2.</ref> This possibility was first raised in a ''TLS'' letter by E. St John Brooks in [[1937]]; in a letter to ''[[Notes and Queries]]'', John Baker has added that only Marlowe could be Arbella's tutor due to the absence of any other known "Morley" from the period with an MA and not otherwise occupied.<ref>John Baker, letter to ''Notes and Queries'' 44.3 (1997), pp. 367-8</ref> Some biographers think that the "Morley" in question may have been a brother of the musician [[Thomas Morley]].<ref>Constance Kuriyama, ''Christopher Marlowe: A Renaissance Life'' (2002), p. 89. Also in Handover's biography of Arbella, and Nicholl, ''The Reckoning'', p. 342.</ref> If Marlowe was Arbella's tutor, it might indicate that he was a spy, since Arbella, niece of [[Mary Queen of Scots]] and cousin of [[James I of England|James VI of Scotland]], later James I of England, was at the time a strong candidate for the succession of Elizabeth's throne.<ref>[http://www.history.ac.uk/ihr/Focus/Elizabeth/index.html Elizabeth I and James VI and I], [http://www.history.ac.uk/ History in Focus].</ref>


'''Significance''' This play is believed by many scholars to be the first play by Christopher Marlowe to be performed.
In [[1592]], Marlowe was arrested in the Dutch town of [[Flushing, Netherlands|Flushing]] for attempting to counterfeit coins. He was sent to be dealt with by the Lord Treasurer ([[William Cecil, 1st Baron Burghley|Burghley]]) but no charge or imprisonment seems to have resulted.<ref>For a full transcript, see [http://www.prst17z1.demon.co.uk/flushing.htm Peter Farey's Marlowe page]</ref>


'''Attribution''' The title page attributes the play to Marlowe and [[Thomas Nashe]], yet some scholars question how much of a contribution Nashe made to the play.<ref>{{Cite journal|last1=Freebury-Jones|first1=Darren|last2=Dahl|first2=Marcus|date=2020-06-01|title=Searching for Thomas Nashe in Dido, Queen of Carthage|url=https://academic.oup.com/dsh/article/35/2/296/5370652|journal=Digital Scholarship in the Humanities|language=en|volume=35|issue=2|pages=296–306|doi=10.1093/llc/fqz008|issn=2055-7671|access-date=23 January 2021|archive-date=29 July 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200729115606/https://academic.oup.com/dsh/article/35/2/296/5370652|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal|last1=Lunney|first1=Ruth|last2=Craig|first2=Hugh|date=2020-09-16|title=Who Wrote Dido, Queen of Carthage?|url=https://journals.shu.ac.uk/index.php/Marlstud/article/view/92|journal=Journal of Marlowe Studies|language=en|volume=1|pages=1–31–1–31|doi=10.7190/jms.v1i0.92|issn=2516-421X|doi-access=free|access-date=23 January 2021|archive-date=22 January 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210122151411/https://journals.shu.ac.uk/index.php/Marlstud/article/view/92|url-status=live}}</ref>
====Arrest and death====
In early May [[1593]] several bills were posted about London threatening Protestant refugees from [[France]] and the [[Netherlands]] who had settled in the city. One of these, the "Dutch church libel",<ref>[http://www.prst17z1.demon.co.uk/libell.htm A Libell, fixte vpon the French Church Wall, in London<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref> written in [[blank verse]], contained allusions to several of Marlowe's plays and was signed "[[Tamburlaine]]." On [[11 May]] the [[Privy Council of the United Kingdom|Privy Council]] ordered the arrest of those responsible for the libels. The next day, Marlowe's colleague [[Thomas Kyd]] was arrested. Kyd's lodgings were searched and a fragment of a [[heretical]] tract was found. Kyd asserted, possibly under [[torture]], that it had belonged to Marlowe. Two years earlier they had both been working for an [[aristocratic]] patron, probably [[Ferdinando Stanley, 5th Earl of Derby|Ferdinando Stanley]], Lord Strange,<ref>Mulryne, J. H. "Thomas Kyd." ''Oxford [[Dictionary of National Biography]]''. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004.</ref> and Kyd suggested that at this time, when they were sharing a workroom, the document had found its way among his papers. Marlowe's arrest was ordered on [[18 May]]. Marlowe was not in London, but was staying with Thomas Walsingham, the cousin of the late Sir [[Francis Walsingham]], Elizabeth's [[Secretary of State|principal secretary]] in the 1580s and a man deeply involved in state espionage.<ref>Haynes, Alan. ''The Elizabethan Secret Service''. London: Sutton, 2005.</ref> However, he duly appeared before the Privy Council on [[20 May]] and was instructed to "give his daily attendance on their Lordships, until he shall be licensed to the contrary." On [[30 May]], Marlowe was murdered.


'''Evidence''' No manuscripts by Marlowe exist for this play.<ref name="Maguire">{{cite book |last1=Maguire |first1=Laurie E. |editor1-last=Cheney |editor1-first=Patrick |title=The Cambridge Champion of Christopher Marlowe |date=2004 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |location=Cambridge |isbn=9780511999055 |page=44 |chapter=Marlovian texts and authorship}}</ref>
Various versions of Marlowe's death were current at the time. [[Francis Meres]] says Marlowe was "stabbed to death by a bawdy serving-man, a rival of his in his lewd love" as punishment for his "epicurism and atheism".<ref>''Palladis Tamia''. London, 1598: 286v-287r.</ref> In [[1917]], in the ''[[Dictionary of National Biography]]'', Sir [[Sidney Lee]] wrote that Marlowe was killed in a drunken fight, and this is still often stated as fact today.


=== ''Tamburlaine, Part I'' ({{circa|1587}}); ''Part II'' ({{circa|1587}}–1588) ===
The facts only came to light in [[1925]] when the scholar [[Leslie Hotson]] discovered the [[coroner]]'s report on Marlowe's death in the [[Public Record Office]].<ref>[http://www.prst17z1.demon.co.uk/inquis~2.htm The Coroner's Inquisition (Translation)<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref> Marlowe had spent all day in a house (''not'' a tavern, as is widely claimed, even in some biographies) in [[Deptford, London|Deptford]], owned by the widow [[Eleanor Bull]], along with three men, [[Ingram Frizer]], Nicholas Skeres and Robert Poley<ref>E. de Kalb, Robert Poley’s Movements as a Messenger of the Court, 1588 to 1601 Review of English Studies, Vol. 9, No. 33</ref>. All three had been employed by the Walsinghams. Skeres and Poley had helped snare the conspirators in the [[Babington plot]]. Frizer was a servant of Thomas Walsingham. Witnesses testified that Frizer and Marlowe had earlier argued over the bill, exchanging "divers malicious words." Later, while Frizer was sitting at a table between the other two and Marlowe was lying behind him on a couch, Marlowe snatched Frizer's dagger and began attacking him. In the ensuing struggle, according to the coroner's report, Marlowe was accidentally stabbed above the right eye, killing him instantly. The jury concluded that Frizer acted in self-defence, and within a month he was pardoned. Marlowe was buried in an unmarked grave in the churchyard of [http://www.deptfordchurch.org St. Nicholas, Deptford], on [[1 June]][[1593]].


[[File:Tamburlaine title page.jpg|thumb|upright=0.70|Title page of the earliest published edition of ''[[Tamburlaine]]'' (1590)]]
Marlowe's death is alleged by some to be an assassination for the following reasons:
# The three men who were in the room with him when he died were all connected both to the state secret service and to the London underworld.<ref>Seaton, Ethel. "Marlowe, Robert Poley, and the Tippings." ''Review of English Studies'' 5 (1929): 273.</ref> Frizer and Skeres also had a long record as loan sharks and con-men, as shown by court records. Bull's house also had "links to the government's spy network."<ref>[[Stephen Greenblatt|Greenblatt, Stephen]] ''Will in the World''. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, Inc., 2004: 268.</ref>
# Their story that they were on a day's pleasure outing to [[Deptford]] is considered implausible. In fact, they spent the whole day closeted together, deep in discussion. Also, [[Robert Poley]] was carrying confidential despatches to the Queen, who was at her palace of Nonsuch in Surrey, but instead of delivering them, he spent the day with Marlowe and the other two.<ref>Nicholl, Charles. ''The Reckoning: The Murder of Christopher Marlowe''. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1995: 32.</ref>
# It seems too much of a coincidence that Marlowe's death occurred only a few days after his arrest for [[Christian heresy|heresy]].
# The manner of Marlowe's arrest suggests causes more tangled than a simple charge of heresy would generally indicate. He was released in spite of ''[[prima facie]]'' evidence, and even though the charges implicitly connected [[Sir Walter Raleigh]] and the Earl of [[Northumberland]] with the heresy. Thus, it seems probable that the investigation was meant primarily as a warning to the politicians in the "[[School of Night]]," and/or that it was connected with a power struggle within the Privy Council itself.<ref>Gray, Austin. "Some Observations on Christopher Marlowe, Government Agent." ''PMLA'' 43 (1928): 692-4.</ref>
# The various incidents that hint at a relationship with the Privy Council (see above), and by the fact that his patron was Thomas Walsingham, Sir [[Francis Walsingham|Francis]]' second cousin, who was actively involved in intelligence work.


'''First official record''' 1587, Part I
For these reasons and others, some believe there was more to Marlowe's death than emerged at the inquest. It is also possible that he was not murdered at all, and that his death was faked. However, on the basis of our current knowledge, it is not possible to draw any firm conclusions about what happened or why. There are different [[Marlovian theory|theories]] of some degree of probability. Since there are only written documents on which to base any conclusions, and since it is probable that the most crucial information about his death was never committed to writing at all, it is unlikely that the full circumstances of Marlowe's death will ever be known.


'''First published''' 1590, Parts I and II in one [[octavo]], [[London]]. No author named.<ref name="Chambers Vol. 3">{{cite book |last1=Chambers |first1=E. K. |title=The Elizabethan Stage. Vol. 3 |date=1923 |publisher=Clarendon Press |location=Oxford |page=421}}</ref>
===Atheism===
Marlowe had a reputation for [[atheism]]; it should be noted, however, that such a imputation would have had markedly different implications during Marlowe's period than in modern times. Contemporary evidence for this is comes from Marlowe's accuser in [[Flushing, Netherlands|Flushing]], an informer called Richard Baines. The governor of Flushing had reported that both men had accused one "of malice one to another" of instigating the counterfeiting, and of intention to go over to [[Catholicism]]; such an action was considered atheistic by the [[Protestant]]s, who constituted the dominant [[religion|religious]] faction in England at that time. Following Marlowe's arrest on a charge of atheism in [[1593]], Baines submitted to the authorities a "note containing the opinion of one Christopher Marly concerning his damnable judgment of religion, and scorn of God's word".<ref>[http://www.prst17z1.demon.co.uk/baines1.htm The 'Baines Note' (1)<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref> Baines attributes to Marlowe a total of eighteen items which "scoff at the pretensions of the [[Old testament|Old]] and [[New Testament]]"<ref name="steane">{{cite book
| last = Steane
| first = J.B.
| title = Introduction to Christopher Marlowe: The Complete Plays
| publisher = Penguin
| date = 1969
| location = Aylesbury, Buckc
| isbn = 0 14 043.037 7}}</ref> such as, "[[Christ]] was a bastard and his mother dishonest [unchaste]", "the woman of Samaria and her sister were whores and that Christ knew them dishonestly" and, "St [[John the Evangelist]] was bedfellow to Christ and leaned always in his bosom" (cf. [http://www.biblegateway.com/cgi-bin/bible?passage=JOHN%2B13%3A23-25&showfn=on&showxref=on&language=english&version=KJV&x=12&y=12 John 13:23-25]) and "that he used him as the sinners of [[Sodom]]". He also claims that Marlowe had Catholic sympathies. Other passages are merely sceptical in tone: "he persuades men to atheism, willing them not to be afraid of bugbears and hobgoblins". Hereafter follows the final paragraph of Baines' document in full:


'''First recorded performance''' 1587, Part I, by the [[Admiral's Men]], London.{{efn|Performing company is listed on the title page of the 1590 octavo. Henslowe's diary first lists Tamburlaine performances in 1593, so the original playhouse is unknown.<ref name="Brooke Tamburlaine">{{cite book |last1=Brooke |first1=C.F. Tucker |editor1-last=Brooke |editor1-first=C.F. Tucker |title=The Works of Christopher Marlowe |date=1910 |publisher=Clarendon Press |location=Oxford |pages=1–5 |edition=1964 Reprint |url=https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=mdp.39015067093248&view=1up&seq=9 |access-date=27 May 2020 |chapter=Tamburlaine |archive-date=4 September 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220904211125/https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=mdp.39015067093248&view=1up&seq=9 |url-status=live }}</ref>}}
<blockquote>These thinges, with many other shall by good & honest witnes be aproved to be his opinions and Comon Speeches, and that this Marlow doth not only hould them himself, but almost into every Company he Cometh he perswades men to Atheism willing them not to be afeard of bugbeares and hobgoblins, and vtterly scorning both god and his ministers as I Richard Baines will Justify & approue both by mine oth and the testimony of many honest men, and almost al men with whome he hath Conversed any time will
testify the same, and as I think all men in Cristianity ought to indevor that the mouth of so dangerous a member may be stopped, he saith likewise that he hath quoted a number of Contrarieties oute of the Scripture which he hath giuen to some great men who in Convenient time shalbe named. When these thinges shalbe Called in question the witnes shalbe produced.<ref name="bainesnote">{{cite web
| title = The 'Baines Note'
| publisher =
| date =
| url = http://www2.prestel.co.uk/rey/baines1.htm
| format =
| doi =
| accessdate = 14/04/08}}</ref></blockquote>


'''Significance''' ''[[Tamburlaine]]'' is the first example of [[blank verse]] used in the [[drama|dramatic literature]] of the [[English renaissance theatre|Early Modern English theatre]].
Similar statements were made by [[Thomas Kyd]] after his imprisonment and possible torture (see below);<ref>[http://www.prst17z1.demon.co.uk/kyd1.htm Kyd's Accusations<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref><ref>[http://www.prst17z1.demon.co.uk/kyd2.htm Kyd's letter to Sir John Puckering<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref> both Kyd and Baines connect Marlowe with the [[mathematician]] [[Thomas Harriot]] and [[Walter Raleigh]]'s circle. Another document claims that Marlowe had read an "atheist lecture" before Raleigh; a man called Richard Chomley was charged with atheism and treason shortly after Marlowe's death, and noted in his testimony that "one Marlowe is able to show more sound reasons from atheism than any divine in England is able to give to prove divinity and that Marlowe told him that he hath read the atheist lecture to Sir Walter Raleigh and others"<ref name="steane" />.


'''Attribution''' Author name is missing from first printing in 1590. Attribution of this work by scholars to Marlowe is based upon comparison to his other verified works. Passages and character development in ''Tamburlane'' are similar to many other Marlowe works.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Marlowe |first=Christopher |year=1971 |title=Tamburlaine |publisher=Ernst Benn Limited |location=London |editor=J.W. Harper}}</ref>
Some critics believe that Marlowe sought to disseminate these views in his work and that he identified with his rebellious and iconoclastic protagonists.<ref>Waith, Eugene. ''The Herculean Hero in Marlowe, Chapman, Shakespeare, and Dryden''. London: Chatto and Windus, 1962. The idea is commonplace, though by no means universally accepted.</ref> However, plays had to be approved by the [[Master of the Revels]] before they could be performed, and the [[censorship]] of publications was under the control of the [[Archbishop of Canterbury]]. Presumably these authorities did not consider any of Marlowe's works to be unacceptable (apart from the ''Amores'').


'''Evidence''' No manuscripts by Marlowe exist for this play.{{sfnp|Maguire|2004|p=44}} Parts I and II were entered into the Stationers' Register on 14 August 1590. The two parts were published together by the London printer, Richard Jones, in 1590; a second edition in 1592, and a third in 1597. The 1597 edition of the two parts were published separately in quarto by Edward White; part I in 1605, and part II in 1606.<ref name=":N"/><ref name="Chambers Vol. 3"/>
===Sexuality===
Marlowe is sometimes described today as [[homosexuality|homosexual]]. Some believe that the question of whether an Elizabethan was "[[gay]]" or "homosexual" in a modern sense is [[anachronistic]]; for the Elizabethans, what is often today termed homosexual or bisexual was more likely to be recognised as simply a sexual act, rather than an exclusive sexual orientation and identity. (see [[Homosexuality#History|History of homosexuality]])


=== ''The Jew of Malta'' ({{circa|1589}}–1590) ===
Some scholars have argued that the evidence is inconclusive and that the reports of Marlowe's homosexuality may simply be exaggerated rumours produced after his death. [[David Bevington]] and [[Eric Rasmussen]] describe Baines's evidence as "unreliable testimony" and make the comment: "These and other testimonials need to be discounted for their exaggeration and for their having been produced under legal circumstances we would regard as a witch-hunt".<ref>''Doctor Faustus and Other Plays'', pp. viii - ix</ref> It has also been noted that Kyd's evidence was given after torture, and thus may have little connection to reality.<ref>[[Frederick S. Boas|Boas, F. S.]] ''Christopher Marlowe: A Biographical and Critical Study''. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1940: 242.</ref> One critic, J.B. Steanes, remarked that he considers there to be "no ''evidence'' for Marlowe's homosexuality at all", but that on the other hand "it seems absurd to dismiss all of these Elizabethan rumours and accusations as 'the Marlowe myth'"<ref name="steane"/>


[[File:Marlowe-jew-of-malta-titlepage 2.jpg|thumb|right|upright=0.70|''[[The Jew of Malta]]'' title page from 1633 [[quarto]]]]
Other scholars have argued that Marlowe's writing contains homosexual themes:
* In ''[[Dido, Queen of Carthage]]'', he opens with a scene of Jupiter "dandling [[Ganymede]] upon his knee" and says "what is't, sweet wag, I should deny thy youth?, whose face reflects such pleasure to mine eyes." Venus complains during the play that Jupiter is playing "with that female wanton boy."
*In ''[[Hero and Leander (poem)|Hero and Leander]]'', Marlowe writes of the male youth Leander, "in his looks were all that men desire" and that when the youth swims to visit Hero at [[Sestos]], the sea god [[Neptune]] becomes sexually excited, "imagining that Ganymede, displeas'd... the lusty god embrac'd him, call'd him love... and steal a kiss... upon his breast, his thighs, and every limb", while the boy naive and unaware of Greek love practices said that, "You are deceiv'd, I am no woman, I... Thereat smil'd Neptune."


'''First official record''' 1592
Diligent classicists often mimicked the homosexual themes they found in Greek and Roman texts (as [[Edmund Spenser]] did in ''The Shepheard's Calendar''), but Marlowe accords these themes more prominence than almost any other writer besides [[Richard Barnfield]]. In conjunction with the rumours preserved in the historical record, the prominence of homosexual themes in Marlowe's work has led some to suspect, especially in the twentieth century, that Marlowe may have had an interest in same-sex love (although not necessarily in homosexual activity).


'''First published''' 1592; earliest extant edition, 1633
For debates of a somewhat similar nature, see [[Sexuality of William Shakespeare]].


'''First recorded performance''' 26 February 1592, by Lord Strange's acting company.{{sfnp|Cheney|2004b|p=11}}
==Marlowe's reputation among contemporary writers==
Whatever the particular focus of modern critics, biographers and novelists, for his contemporaries in the literary world, Marlowe was above all an admired and influential artist. Within weeks of his death, [[George Peele]] remembered him as "Marley, the Muses' darling"; [[Michael Drayton]] noted that he "Had in him those brave translunary things/That the first poets had", and [[Ben Jonson]] wrote of "Marlowe's mighty line". [[Thomas Nashe]] wrote warmly of his friend, "poor deceased Kit Marlowe". So too did the publisher Edward Blount, in the dedication of ''Hero and Leander'' to Sir Thomas Walsingham.


'''Significance''' The performances of the play were a success and it remained popular for the next fifty years. This play helps to establish the strong theme of "anti-authoritarianism" that is found throughout Marlowe's works.
Among the few contemporary dramatists to say anything negative about Marlowe was the anonymous author of the Cambridge University play ''[[Parnassus plays|The Return From Parnassus]]'' ([[1598]]) who wrote, "Pity it is that wit so ill should dwell,/Wit lent from heaven, but vices sent from hell."


'''Evidence''' No manuscripts by Marlowe exist for this play.{{sfnp|Maguire|2004|p=44}} The play was entered in the [[Stationers' Register]] on 17 May 1594 but the earliest surviving printed edition is from 1633.
The most famous tribute to Marlowe was paid by [[Shakespeare]] in ''[[As You Like It]]'', where he not only quotes a line from ''[[Hero and Leander]]'' (Dead Shepherd, now I find thy saw of might, "Who ever loved that loved not at first sight?") but also gives to the clown [[Touchstone (As You Like It)|Touchstone]] the words "When a man's verses cannot be understood, nor a man's good wit seconded with the forward child, understanding, it strikes a man more dead than a great reckoning in a little room." This appears to be a reference to Marlowe's murder (which involved a fight over the "reckoning" – the bill).


===''Doctor Faustus'' ({{circa|1588}}–1592)===
Shakespeare was indeed very influenced by Marlowe in his early work as can be seen in the re-using of Marlowe themes in ''[[Anthony and Cleopatra]]'', ''[[The Merchant of Venice]]'', ''[[Richard II (play)|Richard II]]'', and ''[[Macbeth]]'' (''Dido'', ''Jew of Malta'', ''Edward II'' and ''Dr Faustus'' respectively). Indeed in ''[[Hamlet]]'', after meeting with the travelling actors, Hamlet starts discussing ''[[Dido, Queen of Carthage]]'' and quoting from it. As this was Marlowe's only play not to have been played in the public theatre we can see that Shakespeare was quite the Marlovian scholar. Indeed in ''[[Love's Labour's Lost]]'', echoing Marlowe's ''[[The Massacre at Paris]]'', Shakespeare brings on a character called Marcade (French for Mercury – the messenger of the Gods – a nickname Marlowe bestowed upon himself) who arrives to "interrupt'st" the "merriment" with news of the King's death. This is a fitting tribute for one who delighted in destruction in his plays.


[[File:Marlowes-Doctor-Faustus-Frontispiece 1631.jpg|thumb|right|upright=0.70|[[Book frontispiece|Frontispiece]] to a 1631 printing of ''[[Doctor Faustus (play)|Doctor Faustus]]'' showing Faustus conjuring Mephistophilis]]
==Marlowe as Shakespeare==
{{Main|Shakespearean authorship question|Marlovian theory}}


'''First official record''' 1594–1597{{sfnp|Healy|2004|p=179}}
Given the murky inconsistencies concerning the account of Marlowe's death, an ongoing [[conspiracy theory]] has arisen centred on the notion that Marlowe may have faked his death and then continued to write under the assumed name of [[William Shakespeare]]. Authors who have propounded this theory include:
*Wilbur Gleason Zeigler ''It Was Marlowe'' (1895)
*[[Calvin Hoffman]], ''The Man Who Was Shakespeare'', Mitre Press (1955)<ref>[http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/muchado/readings/hoffman.html frontline: much ado about something: readings: from the murder of the man who was shakespeare | PBS<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref>
*[[Calvin Hoffman]], ''The Murder of the Man Who Was Shakespeare'', Grosset & Dunlap (1960)
*Louis Ule, ''Christopher Marlowe (1564-1607): A Biography''
*A D Wraight, ''The Story that the Sonnets Tell'' (1994)
*Roderick L Eagle, ''The Mystery of Marlowe's Death'', N&Q (1952)
*William Honey, ''The Shakespeare Epitaph Deciphered'', Mitre Press (1969)


'''First published''' 1601, no [[extant literature|extant copy]]; first [[extant literature|extant copy]], 1604 (A text) [[quarto]]; 1616 (B text) [[quarto]].{{sfnp|Healy|2004|pp=xix, 179}}
==Works==
The dates of composition are approximate.


'''First recorded performance''' 1594–1597; 24 revival performances occurred between these years by the [[Admiral's Men|Lord Admiral's Company]], [[The Rose (theatre)|Rose Theatre]], [[London]]; earlier performances probably occurred around 1589 by the same company.{{sfnp|Healy|2004|p=179}}
===Plays===

*''[[Dido, Queen of Carthage]]'' (''c''.1586) (possibly co-written with [[Thomas Nashe]])
'''Significance''' This is the first dramatised version of the [[Faust]] legend of a scholar's dealing with the devil. Marlowe deviates from earlier versions of [[Deal with the Devil|"The Devil's Pact"]] significantly: Marlowe's protagonist is unable to "burn his books" or repent to a merciful God to have his contract annulled at the end of the play; he is carried off by demons; and, in the 1616 [[quarto]], his mangled corpse is found by the scholar characters.
*''[[Tamburlaine (play)|Tamburlaine]], part 1'' (''c''.1587)

*''[[Tamburlaine (play)|Tamburlaine]], part 2'' (''c''.1587-1588)
'''Attribution''' The 'B text' was highly edited and censored, owing in part to the shifting theatre laws regarding religious words onstage during the seventeenth-century. Because it contains several additional scenes believed to be the additions of other playwrights, particularly [[Samuel Rowley]] and William Bird (''alias'' Borne), a recent edition attributes the authorship of both versions to "Christopher Marlowe and his collaborator and revisers." This recent edition has tried to establish that the 'A text' was assembled from Marlowe's work and another writer, with the 'B text' as a later revision.{{sfnp|Healy|2004|p=179}}<ref>"The Tragical History of Doctor Faustus" ('A' Text) and ('B' Text) in David Bevington and Eric Rasmussen (eds.), Christopher Marlowe, ''Doctor Faustus and Other Plays, World's Classics'' (Oxford University Press, 1995).</ref>
*''[[The Jew of Malta]]'' (''c''.1589)

*''[[The Tragical History of Doctor Faustus|Doctor Faustus]]'' (''c''.1589, or, ''c''.1593)
'''Evidence''' No manuscripts by Marlowe exist for this play.{{sfnp|Maguire|2004|p=44}} The two earliest-printed [[extant literature|extant versions]] of the play, A and B, form a textual problem for scholars. Both were published after Marlowe's death and scholars disagree which text is more representative of Marlowe's original. Some editions are based on a combination of the two texts. Late-twentieth-century scholarly consensus identifies 'A text' as more representative because it contains irregular character names and [[idiosyncratic]] spelling, which are believed to reflect the author's handwritten manuscript or "[[foul papers]]". In comparison, 'B text' is highly edited with several additional scenes possibly written by other playwrights.{{sfnp|Healy|2004|pp=xix, 179}}
*''[[Edward II (play)|Edward II]]'' (''c''.1592)

*''[[The Massacre at Paris]]'' (''c''.1593)
===''Edward the Second'' ({{circa|1592}})===

[[File:Edward2a.jpg|thumb|upright=0.70|Title page of the earliest published text of ''[[Edward II (play)|Edward II]]'' (1594)]]

'''First official record''' 1593{{sfnp|Cheney|2004a|p=xix}}

'''First published''' 1590; earliest extant edition 1594 [[octavo]]{{sfnp|Cheney|2004a|p=xix}}

'''First recorded performance''' 1592, performed by the Earl of Pembroke's Men.{{sfnp|Cheney|2004a|p=xix}}

'''Significance''' Considered by recent scholars as Marlowe's "most modern play" because of its probing treatment of the private life of a king and unflattering depiction of the power politics of the time.{{sfnp|Cartelli|2004|pp=158–159}} The 1594 editions of ''Edward II'' and of ''Dido'' are the first published plays with Marlowe's name appearing as the author.{{sfnp|Cheney|2004a|p=xix}}

'''Attribution''' Earliest extant edition of 1594.{{sfnp|Cheney|2004a|p=xix}}

'''Evidence''' The play was entered into the [[Stationers' Register]] on 6 July 1593, five weeks after Marlowe's death.{{sfnp|Cheney|2004a|p=xix}}

===''The Massacre at Paris'' ({{circa|1589}}–1593)===

{{multiple image |total_width=300 |align=right |direction=horizontal
|image1= Massacre-at-paris-marlowe.jpg |caption1=Title page to a rare extant printed copy of ''[[The Massacre at Paris]]'' by Christopher Marlowe; undated.
|image2= Handwriting-Marlowe-Massacre-1.JPG |caption2= Alleged [[Foul papers|foul sheet]] from Marlowe's writing of ''[[The Massacre at Paris]]'' (1593). Reproduced from [[Folger Shakespeare Library]] Ms.J.b.8. Recent scholars consider this manuscript part of a "reconstruction" by another hand.
}}

'''First official record '''{{circa|1593}}, alleged [[Foul papers|foul sheet]] by Marlowe of "Scene 19"; although authorship by Marlowe is contested by recent scholars, the manuscript is believed written while the play was first performed and with an unknown purpose.

'''First published''' undated, {{circa|1594}} or later, [[octavo]], London;<ref name="Brooke">{{cite book |last1=Brooke |first1=C.F. Tucker |editor1-last=Brooke |editor1-first=C.F. Tucker |title=The Works of Christopher Marlowe |date=1910 |publisher=Clarendon Press |location=Oxford |page=440 |url=https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=mdp.39015067093248&view=1up&seq=9 |chapter=The Massacre at Paris |access-date=11 June 2020 |archive-date=4 September 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220904211125/https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=mdp.39015067093248&view=1up&seq=9 |url-status=live }}</ref> while this is the most complete surviving text, it is near half the length of Marlowe's other works and possibly a reconstruction.{{sfnp|Maguire|2004|p=44}} The printer and publisher credit, "E.A. for Edward White," also appears on the 1605/06 printing of Marlowe's ''[[Tamburlaine]]''.<ref name="Brooke"/>

'''First recorded performance''' 26 Jan 1593, by [[Lord Strange's Men]], at Henslowe's [[The Rose (theatre)|Rose Theatre]], London, under the title ''The Tragedy of the Guise'';<ref name="Brooke"/> 1594, in the repertory of the [[Admiral's Men]].{{sfnp|Maguire|2004|p=44}}

'''Significance''' ''The Massacre at Paris'' is considered Marlowe's most dangerous play, as agitators in London seized on its theme to advocate the murders of refugees from the [[Spanish Netherlands|low countries]] of the [[Spanish Netherlands]], and it warns [[Elizabeth I]] of this possibility in its last scene.{{sfnp|Nicholl|1992|p=[https://archive.org/details/reckoningmurdero0000nich/page/41 41]|loc="Libels and Heresies"}}<ref>{{cite book |last=Hoenselaars|first=A. J. |title=Images of Englishmen and Foreigners in the Drama of Shakespeare and His Contemporaries |publisher=Fairleigh Dickinson University Press |location=Madison, New Jersey |year=1992 |pages=78–79 |chapter=Englishmen abroad 1558–1603 |isbn=978-0-8386-3431-8}}</ref> It features the silent "English Agent", whom tradition has identified with Marlowe and his connexions to the secret service.{{sfnp|Wilson|2004|p=207}} Highest grossing play for [[Lord Strange's Men]] in 1593.<ref>From Henslowe's Diary. ''Cambridge Companion'', 2004, p. 199.</ref>

'''Attribution''' A 1593 loose manuscript sheet of the play, called a [[Foul papers|foul sheet]], is alleged to be by Marlowe and has been claimed by some scholars as the only extant play manuscript by the author. It could also provide an approximate date of composition for the play. When compared with the extant printed text and his other work, other scholars reject the attribution to Marlowe. The only surviving printed text of this play is possibly a [[Memorial reconstruction|reconstruction from memory]] of Marlowe's original performance text. Current scholarship notes that there are only 1147 lines in the play, half the amount of a typical play of the 1590s. Other evidence that the extant published text may not be Marlowe's original is the uneven style throughout, with two-dimensional characterisations, deteriorating verbal quality and repetitions of content.{{sfnp|Maguire|2004|pp=44–45}}

'''Evidence''' Never appeared in the Stationer's Register.{{sfnp|Deats|2004|p=199}}

==Memorials==
{{CSS image crop
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|bSize = 200
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''[[Marlowe Memorial|The Muse of Poetry]]'', a [[bronze sculpture]] by [[Edward Onslow Ford]] references Marlowe and his work. It was erected on Buttermarket, Canterbury in 1891, and now stands outside the [[Marlowe Theatre]] in the city.<ref name="Rogers">{{cite book|title=Labour, Life and Literature|date=1913|first=Frederick|last=Rogers|publisher=Smith, Elder & Co|location=London|pages=160–167|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=4wEPAAAAQAAJ|access-date=25 August 2017|archive-date=30 December 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191230225139/https://books.google.com/books?id=4wEPAAAAQAAJ|url-status=live}}</ref><ref name="The Marlowe" />


In July 2002, a memorial window to Marlowe was unveiled by the Marlowe Society at [[Poets' Corner]] in [[Westminster Abbey]].<ref>[http://www.westminster-abbey.org/our-history/people/christopher-marlowe Christopher Marlowe] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130621234108/http://www.westminster-abbey.org/our-history/people/christopher-marlowe |date=21 June 2013 }} – Westminster Abbey</ref> Controversially, a question mark was added to his generally accepted date of death.<ref>{{cite journal|author=Nigel Reynolds|url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1401010/Marlowe-tribute-puts-question-mark-over-Shakespeare.html |archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/archive/20220111/https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1401010/Marlowe-tribute-puts-question-mark-over-Shakespeare.html |archive-date=11 January 2022 |url-access=subscription |url-status=live |title=Marlowe tribute puts question mark over Shakespeare|journal=The Telegraph|date=11 July 2002}}{{cbignore}}</ref> On 25 October 2011 a letter from Paul Edmondson and [[Stanley Wells]] was published by ''[[The Times]]'' newspaper, in which they called on the Dean and Chapter to remove the question mark on the grounds that it "flew in the face of a mass of unimpugnable evidence". In 2012, they renewed this call in their e-book ''Shakespeare Bites Back'', adding that it "denies history" and again the following year in their book ''Shakespeare Beyond Doubt''.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Edmondson |first1=Paul |last2=Wells |first2=Stanley |year=2011 |title=Shakespeare Bites Back |pages=21, 22 & 38 |url=https://bloggingshakespeare.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/Shakespeare_Bites_Back_Book.pdf |access-date=2022-02-15 |via=Blogging Shakespeare |archive-date=15 February 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220215172840/https://bloggingshakespeare.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/Shakespeare_Bites_Back_Book.pdf |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Edmondson |first1=Paul |last2=Wells |first2=Stanley |year=2013 |title=Shakespeare beyond doubt: evidence, argument, controversy |place=Cambridge |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=9781107017597 |pages=234, 278}}</ref>
The play ''[[Lust's Dominion]]'' was attributed to Marlowe upon its initial publication in 1657, though scholars and critics have almost unanimously rejected the attribution.


The [[Marlowe Theatre]] in [[Canterbury]], [[Kent]], UK, was named for Marlowe in 1949.<ref name="The Marlowe">{{cite web |title=The Marlowe |url=https://marlowetheatre.com/about/ |website=marlowetheatre.com |access-date=10 Jun 2020 |archive-date=14 June 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200614203604/https://marlowetheatre.com/about/ |url-status=live }}</ref>
===Poetry===
*Translation of [[Lucan (poet)|Lucan]]'s ''[[Pharsalia]]'' (date unknown)
*Translation of [[Ovid]]'s ''Elegies'' (''c''. 1580s?)
*''[[The Passionate Shepherd to His Love]]'' (pre-1593; because it is constantly referred to in his own plays we can presume an early date of mid-1580s)
*''[[Hero and Leander]]'' (''c''. 1593, unfinished; completed by [[George Chapman]], 1598)


==Marlowe in fiction==
==Marlowe in fiction==
{{Main|Christopher Marlowe in fiction}}
*The upcoming play 'Upstart Crows' written by Mike Punter centres around the life of Marlowe, [[Edward Alleyn]], Jack Alleyn and other characters that centre around their lives. Its first performance was at the Edward Alleyn theatre in [[Dulwich College]] in November 2007, and it goes on from there to be performed in the 2008 Edinburgh fringe festival.
*Marlowe was the title character of a [[Marlowe (musical)|1981 stage musical]] that had a brief Broadway run. It was rather unsuccessful.
*Marlowe features heavily in the [[Harry Turtledove]] alternative history novel ''[[Ruled Britannia]]'' ([[2002]]), about an [[England]] ruled by [[Roman Catholicism|Catholics]]. He is depicted as a contemporary and friend of [[Shakespeare]].
*Marlowe is played by [[Rupert Everett]] in the film ''[[Shakespeare in Love]]'' ([[1998]]), in which he helps Shakespeare to write ''[[Romeo and Juliet]]''. His last line is a cheery "Well, I'm off to Deptford!" After Marlowe's murder, screenwriters Marc Norman and Tom Stoppard have Shakespeare say, "I would change all my plays to come for one of his that will never come".
*Marlowe had survived his assassination in the tangentially alternative history novel ''Armor of Light'' by [[Melissa Scott]] and [[Lisa A. Barnett]], rescued by [[Philip Sidney|Sir Philip Sidney]], who in reality died before then, and plays a major role in the story.
*In [[Neil Gaiman]]'s comic ''[[Sandman (Vertigo)|The Sandman]]'', Marlowe makes a brief appearance in a pub. He and Shakespeare are discussing the content of "[[Faustus]]" while [[Morpheus]] and an immortal human have their own conversation. Marlowe is represented as a great playwright with the young and inexperienced Shakespeare in awe of his friend. Marlowe is also referenced in a later Shakespeare-centric ''Sandman'' comic, in which Morpheus tells Shakespeare of his friend's assassination.
* Marlowe is a central character in [[Lisa Goldstein]]'s fantasy novel ''[[Strange Devices of the Sun and Moon]]''
* [[Connie Willis]]'s "Winter's tale" features Marlowe as a major character.
* [[Louise Welsh]]'s ''[[Tamburlaine Must Die]]'' is a [[novel]] based on a fictitious theory about the last two weeks of Marlowe's life.
*Leslie Silbert's ''[[The Intelligencer]]'', a novel, intertwines Marlowe as a possible spy in his time and events in the present, Washington Square Press, 2004. ISBN 0-7434-3292-4
*Anthony Burgess, ''[[A Dead Man in Deptford]]'' is an account of Marlowe and his death; according to Burgess, it is fictionalized but does not depart from any known historical facts.
* ''[[The School of Night]]'' (ISBN 0-312-28778-X), by [[Alan Wall]], features a protagonist/narrator who constructs a theory identifying a not-really-dead Marlowe as the author of Shakespeare's works, with the Stratfordian merely a cat's-paw enlisted to pass them off as his own for money and/or because Marlowe's espionage on the continent discovered that Shakespeare was a crypto-Catholic.
* Marlowe is the central character in ''One Dagger for Two'' by [[Philip Lindsay]], which includes some speculation about his death.
* Marlowe is one of the guest characters, having allegedly survived his murder sixteen years previously, in [[Andy Lane]]'s ''[[The Empire of Glass]]'', a ''[[Doctor Who]]'' Missing Adventure featuring the [[First Doctor]] and set in [[Venice]].
* Marlowe appears in four chapters of ''[[The Player's Boy]]'', a children's book by [[Antonia Forest]]. He gives the fictional character Nicholas Marlow a ride to London in May 1593; Nicholas witnesses Marlowe's death in the house in Deptford, and later becomes a boy actor in the same company as William Shakespeare.
* Marlowe is the central character in [[The Christopher Marlowe Mysteries]] written by [[Ged Parsons]] for [[BBC Radio 4]] ([[1993]]). This was a series of comedy adventures revolving around Marlowe's work as a spy. The four stories were: ''The Curious Case of the Curs'd Quayside'', ''The Turbulent Tale of the Troubl'd Tragedy'', ''The Perplex'd Plot of the Perilous Plague'' and ''The Murky Mystery of Murder at St Mark's''. The series is repeated on digital radio station [[BBC 7]].
* Marlowe is referenced in [[Tom Holt]]'s ''Faust Among Equals'' (ISBN 1-85723-265-8) to great comic effect.
* Marlowe is one of several main characters in Rosemary Laurey's vampire series. He explains at one point that if his friend, Thomas Kyd had not turned him, he would have died.
* Marlowe is a major protagonist in [[Elizabeth Bear]]'s Promethean Age books, specifically ''Whiskey & Water'' and ''Ink & Steel'', and the short story ''[http://www.scifi.com/scifiction/originals/originals_archive/bear/ This Tragic Glass]''.
*Christopher "Kit" Marlowe is alive and well (so to speak) as a vampire and is the main hero of Rosemary Laurey's paranormal romance "Kiss Me Forever". His character is also included in several of the sequel novels. Marlowe's heroine, modern Dixie LaPage, coincidentally, is well versed in his work before she meets him.
*Christian Camargo played the role of Kit Marlowe in the 2001 production of David Grimm's ''Kit Marlowe'' at the New York Public Theater. The production was a dark portrayal of Marlowe's life as a spy, playwright and lover.


Marlowe has been used as a character in books, theatre, film, television, games and radio.
== See also ==

*[[The School of Night]]
==Modern compendia==
{{Bardauthor}}
Modern scholarly collected works of Marlowe include:
* ''The Complete Works of Christopher Marlowe'' (edited by [[Roma Gill]] in 1986; Clarendon Press published in partnership with Oxford University Press)
* ''The Complete Plays of Christopher Marlowe'' (edited by [[J. B. Steane]] in 1969; edited by Frank Romany and Robert Lindsey, Revised Edition, 2004, Penguin)

==Works of Marlowe in performance==
[[File:Faustus-FTP-Poster.jpg|thumb|right|upright=0.8|Poster for the 1937, New York [[Works Progress Administration|WPA]] [[Federal Theatre Project]] production of ''Doctor Faustus'']]

===Radio===
* [[BBC Radio]] broadcast adaptations of Marlowe's six plays from May to October 1993.{{sfnp|Potter|2004|p=277}}

===Royal Shakespeare Company===

[[Royal Shakespeare Company]]
* ''Dido, Queen of Carthage'', directed by Kimberly Sykes, with [[Chipo Chung]] as Dido. [[Swan Theatre, Stratford-upon-Avon|Swan Theatre]], 2017.<ref name="RSC Dido">{{cite web |title=Dido, Queen of Carthage |url=https://www.rsc.org.uk/dido-queen-of-carthage |website=rsc.org.uk |publisher=Royal Shakespeare Company |access-date=10 Jun 2020 |archive-date=28 July 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200728134908/https://www.rsc.org.uk/dido-queen-of-carthage |url-status=live }}</ref>
* ''Tamburlaine the Great'', directed by [[Terry Hands]], with [[Anthony Sher]] as Tamburlaine. Swan Theatre, 1992; [[Barbican Theatre]], 1993.<ref name="Warwick Tamburlaine">{{cite web |title=Tamburlaine-Professional Productions |url=https://warwick.ac.uk/fac/arts/ren/researchcurrent/elizabethan_jacobean_drama/christopher_marlowe/tamburlaine_stage_history/professional/ |website=Centre for the Study of the Renaissance |publisher=University of Warwick |access-date=10 Jun 2020 |archive-date=15 June 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200615185756/https://warwick.ac.uk/fac/arts/ren/researchcurrent/elizabethan_jacobean_drama/christopher_marlowe/tamburlaine_stage_history/professional/ |url-status=live }}</ref><ref name="Guardian Sher">{{cite web |last1=Sher |first1=Anthony |title=Antony Sher: I never saw myself as a classical actor; Monologue: actors on acting Royal Shakespeare Company |url=https://www.theguardian.com/stage/2014/oct/07/antony-sher-rsc-henry-iv-theatre-acting |website=[[The Guardian]] |access-date=14 Jun 2020 |date=7 Oct 2014 |archive-date=28 July 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200728132543/https://www.theguardian.com/stage/2014/oct/07/antony-sher-rsc-henry-iv-theatre-acting |url-status=live }}</ref>
* ''Tamburlaine the Great'' directed by [[Michael Boyd (theatre director)|Michael Boyd]], with Jude Owusu as Tamburlaine. Swan Theatre, 2018.<ref name="Guardian Tamburlaine">{{cite web |last1=Clapp |first1=Susannah |author-link=Susannah Clapp |title=The week in theatre: Tamburlaine; Pericles – reviews |url=https://www.theguardian.com/stage/2018/sep/02/tamburlaine-swan-stratford-upon-avon-pericles-olivier-national-reviews |website=[[The Guardian]] |access-date=10 Jun 2020 |date=2 Sep 2018 |archive-date=28 July 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200728164232/https://www.theguardian.com/stage/2018/sep/02/tamburlaine-swan-stratford-upon-avon-pericles-olivier-national-reviews |url-status=live }}</ref>
* ''The Jew of Malta'', directed by [[Barry Kyle]], with [[Jasper Britton]] as Barabas. Swan Theatre, 1987; [[People's Theatre, Newcastle upon Tyne|People's Theatre]], and Barbican Theatre, 1988.<ref name="Warwick Jew of Malta">{{cite web |title=The Jew of Malta - Professional Productions |url=https://warwick.ac.uk/fac/arts/ren/researchcurrent/elizabethan_jacobean_drama/christopher_marlowe/christopher_marlowe/stage_history/professional |website=warwick.ac.uk |publisher=Centre for the Study of the Renaissance, University of Warwick |access-date=15 Jun 2020 |archive-date=15 June 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200615185757/https://warwick.ac.uk/fac/arts/ren/researchcurrent/elizabethan_jacobean_drama/christopher_marlowe/christopher_marlowe/stage_history/professional |url-status=live }}</ref><ref name="Godwin">{{cite journal |last1=Godwin |first1=Laura Grace |title=Merchant and Jew at the Royal Shakespeare Company |journal=Shakespeare Bulletin |date=Fall 2016 |volume=13 |issue=3 |pages=511–520 |url=https://www.proquest.com/ |access-date=14 Jun 2020 |publisher=Johns Hopkins University Press |location=Baltimore |doi=10.1353/shb.2016.0043 |s2cid=193444360 |archive-date=16 February 2015 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150216145707/http://www.csa.com/discoveryguides/gmfood/overview.php |url-status=live }}</ref>
* ''The Jew of Malta'', directed by Justin Audibert, with Jasper Britton as Barabas. Swan Theatre, 2015.<ref name="Clapp Jew of Malta">{{cite web |last1=Clapp |first1=Susannah |title=The Jew of Malta review – prescient, reverberating, immediate |url=https://www.theguardian.com/stage/2015/apr/05/jew-of-malta-review-rsc-stratford |website=[[The Guardian]] |access-date=14 Jun 2020 |date=5 Apr 2015 |archive-date=15 June 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200615201509/https://www.theguardian.com/stage/2015/apr/05/jew-of-malta-review-rsc-stratford |url-status=live }}</ref>
* ''Edward II'', directed by [[Gerard Murphy (Irish actor)|Gerard Murphy]], with [[Simon Russell Beale]] as Edward. Swan Theatre, 1990.{{sfnp|Potter|2004|p=273}}
* ''Doctor Faustus'', directed by [[John Barton (director)|John Barton]], with [[Ian McKellen]] as Faustus. [[Nottingham Playhouse]] and [[Aldwych Theatre]], 1974, and [[Royal Shakespeare Theatre]], 1975.{{sfnp|Potter|2004|p=265}}<ref name="Warwick Faustus">{{cite web |title=Doctor Faustus - Professional Productions |url=https://warwick.ac.uk/fac/arts/ren/researchcurrent/elizabethan_jacobean_drama/christopher_marlowe/dr_faustus/stage_history/professional |website=warwick.ac.uk |publisher=Centre for the Study of the Renaissance, University of Warwick |access-date=15 Jun 2020 |archive-date=28 July 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200728132336/https://warwick.ac.uk/fac/arts/ren/researchcurrent/elizabethan_jacobean_drama/christopher_marlowe/dr_faustus/stage_history/professional |url-status=live }}</ref>
* ''Doctor Faustus'' directed by [[Barry Kyle]] with Gerard Murphy as Faustus, Swan Theatre and [[Barbican Centre|Pit Theatre]], 1989.{{sfnp|Potter|2004|p=273}}<ref name="Warwick Faustus"/>
* ''Doctor Faustus'' directed by Maria Aberg, with Sandy Grierson and Oliver Ryan sharing the roles of Faustus and Mephistophilis. Swan Theatre and Barbican Theatre, 2016.<ref name="Guardian Wiegand">{{cite web |last1=Wiegand |first1=Chris |title=Your own personal demon: Maria Aberg on her Doctor Faustus double act |url=https://www.theguardian.com/stage/2016/feb/12/maria-aberg-rsc-stratford-doctor-faustus-sandy-grierson-oliver-ryan-christopher-marlowe |website=[[The Guardian]] |access-date=15 Jun 2020 |date=12 Feb 2016 |archive-date=28 July 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200728141903/https://www.theguardian.com/stage/2016/feb/12/maria-aberg-rsc-stratford-doctor-faustus-sandy-grierson-oliver-ryan-christopher-marlowe |url-status=live }}</ref>

===Royal National Theatre===

[[Royal National Theatre]]
* ''Tamburlaine'', directed by [[Peter Hall (director)|Peter Hall]], with [[Albert Finney]] as Tamburlaine. [[Olivier Theatre]], 1976.<ref name="Warwick Tamburlaine"/>
* ''Dido, Queen of Carthage'', directed by James McDonald with [[Anastasia Hille]] as Dido. [[Royal National Theatre|Cottesloe Theatre]], 2009.<ref name="Billington Dido">{{cite web |last1=Billington |first1=Michael |title=Dido, Queen of Carthage; Christopher Marlowe |url=https://www.theguardian.com/stage/2009/mar/25/dido-queen-of-carthage-cottlesloe-london |website=[[The Guardian]] |access-date=15 Jun 2020 |date=25 Mar 2009 |archive-date=16 June 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200616145059/https://www.theguardian.com/stage/2009/mar/25/dido-queen-of-carthage-cottlesloe-london |url-status=live }}</ref><ref name="Lunney">{{cite book |last1=Lunney |first1=Ruth |editor1-last=Logan |editor1-first=Robert A. |editor2-last=Deats |editor2-first=Sara Munson |title=Christopher Marlowe at 450 |date=2015 |publisher=Routledge |location=London |isbn=9781315571959 |page=41 |edition=1st |chapter=Dido, Queen of Carthage}}</ref>
* ''Edward II'', directed by [[Joe Hill-Gibbins]], with [[John Heffernan (British actor)|John Heffernan]] as Edward. Olivier Theatre, 2013.<ref name="Guardian Edward">{{cite web |last1=Billington |first1=Michael |title=Edward II – review |url=https://www.theguardian.com/stage/2013/sep/05/edward-ii-review |website=[[The Guardian]] |access-date=15 Jun 2020 |date=5 Sep 2013 |archive-date=28 July 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200728131721/https://www.theguardian.com/stage/2013/sep/05/edward-ii-review |url-status=live }}</ref>

===Shakespeare's Globe===

[[Shakespeare's Globe]]
* ''Dido, Queen of Carthage'', directed by [[Tim Carroll]], with [[Rakie Ayola]] as Dido, 2003.<ref name="Billington Dido Globe">{{cite web |last1=Billington |first1=Michael |title=Dido, Queen of Carthage; Shakespeare's Globe |url=https://www.theguardian.com/stage/2003/jun/23/theatre.artsfeatures1 |website=[[The Guardian]] |access-date=15 Jun 2020 |date=22 Jun 2003 |archive-date=16 June 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200616153748/https://www.theguardian.com/stage/2003/jun/23/theatre.artsfeatures1 |url-status=live }}</ref>
* ''Edward II'', directed by Timothy Walker, with Liam Brennan as Edward, 2003.<ref name="Mahoney">{{cite web |last1=Mahoney |first1=Elizabeth |title=Edward II; Shakespeare's Globe |url=https://www.theguardian.com/stage/2003/aug/19/theatre |website=[[The Guardian]] |access-date=15 Jun 2020 |date=18 Aug 2003 |archive-date=16 June 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200616155405/https://www.theguardian.com/stage/2003/aug/19/theatre |url-status=live }}</ref>

===Malthouse Theatre===
The Marlowe Sessions<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.dramaandtheatre.co.uk/features/article/golden-boy-christopher-marlowe|title=Golden boy: Christopher Marlowe|website=Drama And Theatre|date=September 2022 |access-date=8 November 2022|archive-date=8 November 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221108110747/https://www.dramaandtheatre.co.uk/features/article/golden-boy-christopher-marlowe|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://cenemagazine.co.uk/news/2021/6/4/the-marlowe-sessions-malthouse-theatre|title=The Marlowe Sessions immersive audio experience comes to Canterbury|website='cene Magazine|access-date=8 November 2022|archive-date=8 November 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221108110746/https://cenemagazine.co.uk/news/2021/6/4/the-marlowe-sessions-malthouse-theatre|url-status=live}}</ref>
* ''Dido, Queen of Carthage'', Directed/Produced by [[Ray Mia]], Performance direction by [[Stephen Unwin]], with [[Thalissa Teixeira]] as Dido, 2022.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://oughttobeclowns.com/2022/05/news-stars-announced-for-the-marlowe-sessions.html/|title=Stars Announced For The Marlowe Sessions|date=17 May 2022|access-date=8 November 2022|archive-date=8 November 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221108110746/https://oughttobeclowns.com/2022/05/news-stars-announced-for-the-marlowe-sessions.html/|url-status=live}}</ref>
* ''Tamburlaine The Great, Part 1'', Directed/Produced by [[Ray Mia]], Performance direction by Phillip Breen, with [[Alan Cox (actor)|Alan Cox]] as Tamburlaine, 2022.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://northwestend.com/spotlight-on-actor-alan-cox-and-the-marlowe-sessions-at-the-malthouse-theatre-canterbury/|title=Spotlight on actor Alan Cox and the Marlowe Sessions|date=13 June 2022|access-date=8 November 2022|archive-date=8 November 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221108110748/https://northwestend.com/spotlight-on-actor-alan-cox-and-the-marlowe-sessions-at-the-malthouse-theatre-canterbury/|url-status=live}}</ref>
* ''The Jew of Malta'', Directed/Produced by [[Ray Mia]], Performance direction by [[Stephen Unwin]], with [[Adrian Schiller]] as Barrabus, 2022.
* ''Tamburlaine the Great, Part 2'', Directed/Produced by Ray Mia, Performance direction by Phillip Breen, with [[Alan Cox (actor)|Alan Cox]] as Tamburlaine, 2022.
* ''Edward the Second'', Directed/Produced by [[Ray Mia]], Performance direction by [[Abigail Rokison]], with [[Jack Holden (actor)|Jack Holden]] as Edward II, 2022.
* ''The Massacre at Paris'', Directed/Produced by [[Ray Mia]], Performance direction by [[Abigail Rokison]], with [[Michael Maloney]] as Guise, 2022.
* ''Dr Faustus'', Directed/Produced by [[Ray Mia]], Performance direction by Phillip Breen, with [[Dominic West]] as Faustus and [[Talulah Riley]] as Mephistopheles, 2022.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.kentonline.co.uk/canterbury/news/a-listers-star-in-play-at-new-kent-theatre-269257/|title=Review: The Wire star Dominic West plays Doctor Faustus|date=24 June 2022|access-date=8 November 2022|archive-date=8 November 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221108110746/https://www.kentonline.co.uk/canterbury/news/a-listers-star-in-play-at-new-kent-theatre-269257/|url-status=live}}</ref>
* ''The Poetry of Christopher Marlowe'', Directed/Produced by [[Ray Mia]], Performance direction by [[Philip Bird]], read by [[Jack Holden (actor)|Jack Holden]], [[Fisayo Akinade]] and [[Philip Bird]], 2022.

===Other stage===
* ''Tamburlaine''. [[Yale University]], 1919.{{sfnp|Potter|2004|pp=262-281}}
* ''Tamburlaine'', directed by [[Tyrone Guthrie]], with [[Donald Wolfit]] as Tamburlaine. [[The Old Vic]], 1951.{{sfnp|Potter|2004|pp=262-281}}
* ''Doctor Faustus'', co-directed by [[Orson Welles]] and [[John Houseman]], with Welles as Faustus and [[Jack Carter (actor)|Jack Carter]] as [[Mephistopheles]]. [[Maxine Elliott's Theatre]], 1937.{{sfnp|Potter|2004|pp=262-281}}
* ''Doctor Faustus'', directed by [[Adrian Noble]]. [[Royal Exchange, Manchester|Royal Exchange]], 1981.{{sfnp|Potter|2004|pp=262-281}}
* ''Edward II'', directed by [[Toby Robertson]], with [[John Barton (director)|John Barton]] as Edward. [[Cambridge]], 1951.{{sfnp|Potter|2004|p=273}}
* ''Edward II'', directed by Toby Robertson, with [[Derek Jacobi]] as Edward. Cambridge, 1958.{{sfnp|Potter|2004|p=273}}
* ''Edward II'', directed by Toby Robertson, with [[Ian McKellen]] as Edward. [[Assembly Rooms (Edinburgh)|Assembly Rooms]], 1969.{{sfnp|Potter|2004|p=273}}<ref>{{cite web |title=Edward II, Comments and Reviews |url=https://mckellen.com/stage/edward/index.htm |website=Ian McKellen |publisher=Sir Ian McKellen |access-date=10 Jun 2020 |archive-date=10 June 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200610182219/https://mckellen.com/stage/edward/index.htm |url-status=live }}</ref>
* ''Edward II'', directed by Jim Stone, Washington Stage Company, 1993;{{sfnp|Potter|2004|p=275}}
* ''Edward II'', directed by Jozsef Ruszt. Budapest, 1998;{{sfnp|Potter|2004|p=275}}
* ''Edward II'', directed by [[Michael Grandage]], with [[Joseph Fiennes]] as Edward. [[Crucible Theatre]], 2001.{{sfnp|Potter|2004|pp=262-281}}
* ''The Massacre in Paris'', directed by [[Patrice Chéreau]]. France, 1972.{{sfnp|Potter|2004|p=276}}

===Stage adaptations===
* ''Edward II'', Phoenix Society, London, 1923.{{sfnp|Potter|2004|p=272}}
* ''Leben Eduards des Zweiten von England'', by [[Bertolt Brecht]] (the first play he directed). [[Munich]] Chamber Theatre, Germany, 1924.{{sfnp|Potter|2004|p=272}}
* ''The Life of Edward II of England'', by Marlowe and Bertold Brecht, directed by [[Frank Dunlop (director)|Frank Dunlop]]. [[Royal National Theatre|National Theatre]], 1968.{{sfnp|Potter|2004|p=272}}
* ''[[Edward II (ballet)|Edward II]]''[[Edward II (ballet)|, adapted as a ballet]], choreographed by [[David Bintley]]. [[Stuttgart Ballet]], 1995. {{sfnp|Potter|2004|p=276}}
* ''Doctor Faustus'', additional text by [[Colin Teevan]], directed by [[Jamie Lloyd (director)|Jamie Lloyd]], with [[Kit Harington]] as Faustus. [[Duke of York's Theatre]], 2016.<ref name="Timeout Faustus">{{cite web |last1=Lukowski |first1=Andrzej |title=Doctor Faustus |url=https://www.timeout.com/london/theatre/doctor-faustus-6 |website=timeout.com |publisher=Time Out |access-date=15 Jun 2020 |date=26 Apr 2016 |archive-date=28 July 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200728150517/https://www.timeout.com/london/theatre/doctor-faustus-6 |url-status=live }}</ref><ref name="thisistheatre Faustus">{{cite web |title=Doctor Faustus |url=http://www.thisistheatre.com/londonshows/doctorfaustus.html |website=thisistheatre.com |access-date=15 Jun 2020 |archive-date=28 July 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200728131400/http://www.thisistheatre.com/londonshows/doctorfaustus.html |url-status=live }}</ref>
* ''Faustus, That Damned Woman'' by [[Chris Bush (playwright)|Chris Bush]], directed by Caroline Byrne. [[Lyric Theatre (Hammersmith)|Lyric Theatre]], 2020.<ref name="Touchstone 2020">{{cite web |title=March 2020 Onwards; Shakespeare in Performance; Current and Forthcoming Renaissance Drama Productions in the UK |url=http://www.touchstone.bham.ac.uk/performance/renaissance%20productions.html |website=touchstone.bham.ac.uk |publisher=Touchstone: Co-operation and Partnership Among UK Shakespeare Collections; University of Birmingham |access-date=15 Jun 2020 |archive-date=28 July 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200728145723/http://www.touchstone.bham.ac.uk/performance/renaissance%20productions.html |url-status=live }}</ref>

===Film===
* ''[[Doctor Faustus (1967 film)|Doctor Faustus]]'', based on [[Nevill Coghill]]'s 1965 production, adapted for [[Richard Burton]] and [[Elizabeth Taylor]], 1967.{{sfnp|Potter|2004|pp=262-281}}
* ''[[Edward II (film)|Edward II]]'', directed by [[Derek Jarman]], 1991.{{sfnp|Potter|2004|pp=262-281}}
* ''Faust'', with some Marlowe dialogue, directed by [[Jan Švankmajer]], 1994.{{sfnp|Potter|2004|pp=262-281}}


==Notes==
==Notes==
{{reflist}}
{{notelist|30em}}


==References==
==Additional reading==
{{Reflist}}
*Brooke, C.F. Tucker. ''The Life of Marlowe and "The Tragedy of Dido, Queen of Carthage."'' London: Methuen, 1930. (pp. 107, 114, 99, 98)
'''Sources'''
*Marlow, Christopher. ''Complete Works.'' Vol. 3: ''Edward II.'' Ed. R. Rowland. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1994. (pp. xxii-xxiii)
* {{cite book |last=Boas |first=Frederick S. |title=Christopher Marlowe: A biographical and critical study |place=Oxford |publisher=Clarendon Press |year=1953}}
*Louis Ule ''Christopher Marlowe (1564-1607): A Biography'', Carlton Press, 1996. ISBN 0-8062-5028-3
* {{cite book |editor-last=Cheney|editor-first=Patrick |title=The Cambridge Companion to Christopher Marlowe |place=Cambridge, UK |publisher=Cambridge University Press |year=2004 |isbn=978-0-521-82034-9 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=hnFyPSdfqQgC|via=Google Books}}
*David Bevington and Eric Rasmussen, ''Doctor Faustus and Other Plays'', OUP, 1998; ISBN 0-19-283445-2
** {{harvc |last1=Cheney |first1=Patrick |anchor-year=2004a |c=Chronology |in=Cheney |year=2004}}
*J. A. Downie and J. T. Parnell, eds., ''Constructing Christopher Marlowe'', Cambridge 2000. ISBN 0-521-57255-X
** {{harvc |last1=Cheney |first1=Patrick |anchor-year=2004b |c=Introduction: Marlowe in the twenty-first century |in=Cheney |year=2004}}
*Constance Kuriyama,''Christopher Marlowe: A Renaissance Life''. Cornell University Press, 2002. ISBN 0-8014-3978-7
** {{harvc |last=Deats|first=Sarah Munson |c='Dido Queen of Carthage' and 'The Massacre at Paris' |in=Cheney |year=2004}}
*Charles Nicholl, ''The Reckoning: The Murder of Christopher Marlowe'', Vintage, 2002 (revised edition) ISBN 0-09-943747-3
** {{harvc |last=Cartelli |first=Thomas |c=Edward II |in=Cheney |year=2004}}
*Alan Shepard, "Marlowe's Soldiers: Rhetorics of Masculinity in the Age of the Armada", Ashgate, 2002. ISBN 0-7546-0229-X
** {{harvc |last=Healy |first=Thomas |c=Doctor Faustus |in=Cheney |year=2004}}
*M. J. Trow, ''Who Killed Kit Marlowe?'', Sutton, 2002; ISBN 0-7509-2963-4
** {{harvc |last=Potter |first=Lois |c=Marlowe in theatre and film |in=Cheney |year=2004}}
*[[Anthony Burgess]], ''A Dead Man in Deptford'', Carroll & Graf, 2003. (novel about Marlowe based on the version of events in ''The Reckoning'') ISBN 0-7867-1152-3
** {{harvc |last=Riggs |first=David |c=Marlowe's life |in=Cheney |year=2004}}
*David Riggs, "The World of Christopher Marlowe", Henry Holt and Co., 2005 ISBN 0-8050-8036-8
** {{harvc |last=Wilson |first=Richard |c=Tragedy, Patronage and Power |in=Cheney |year=2004}}
*Louise Walsh "Tamburlaine Must Die", novella based around the build up to Marlowe's death.
* {{cite book |editor-last1=Downie|editor-first1=J. A. |editor-last2=Parnell|editor-first2=J. T. |year=2000 |title=Constructing Christopher Marlowe |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=0-521-57255-X}}
*John Passfield, ''Water Lane: The Pilgrimage of Christopher Marlowe'' (novel) Authorhouse, 2005 ISBN 1-4208-1558-X
* {{cite book |last1=Dyce |first1=Alexander |editor1-last=Dyce |editor1-first=Alexander |year=1850 |title=The works of Christopher Marlowe, with notes and some account of his life and writings by the Rev. Alexander Dyce |publisher=William Pickering |location=London |edition=1st}}
*John Passfield, ''The Making of Water Lane'' (journal) Authorhouse, 2005 ISBN 1-4208-2020-6
*Park Honan, ''Christopher Marlowe Poet and Spy'' Oxford University Press, 2005 ISBN 0-19-818695-9
* {{cite book |last1=Honan |first1=Park |title=Christopher Marlowe: Poet and Spy |year=2005 |publisher=Oxford University Press |location=Oxford, New York |isbn=0198186959}}
* {{cite book |last=Hotson|first=Leslie|year=1925|title=The Death of Christopher Marlowe}}
*John Parker, "The Aesthetics of Antichrist: From Christian Drama to Christopher Marlowe." Cornell University Press, 2007. ISBN 978-0-8014-4519-4
* {{cite book |last1=Kuriyama |first1=Constance |title=Christopher Marlowe: A Renaissance Life |year=2002 |publisher=Cornell University Press |location=Ithaca |isbn=0801439787}}
* {{cite book |last1=Logan |first1=Robert A. |title=Shakespeare's Marlowe: the influence of Christopher Marlowe on Shakespeare's artistry |year=2007 |publisher=Ashgate |location=Aldershot, England; Burlington, VT |isbn=978-0754657637}}
* {{cite book|last=Nicholl|first=Charles|title=The Reckoning: The Murder of Christopher Marlowe |publisher=Jonathan Cape |location=London|year=1992|chapter=|isbn=978-0-224-03100-4 |url-access=registration |url=https://archive.org/details/reckoningmurdero0000nich}}
* {{cite book |last=Nicholl |first=Charles |title=The Reckoning: The Murder of Christopher Marlowe |publisher=Vintage |year=2002 |edition=revised |isbn=0-09-943747-3}}
* {{cite book |last=Tannenbaum |first=Samuel |year=1926 |title=The Assassination of Christopher Marlowe |place=New York}}
* {{cite book |last1=Wilson |first1=Richard |title=Christopher Marlowe |editor=Wilson, Richard |year=1999 |publisher=[[Routledge]] |location=London, New York |chapter=Introduction}}

==Further reading==
{{Refbegin}}
* Bevington, David, and Eric Rasmussen, eds. ''Doctor Faustus and Other Plays''. Oxford English Drama. Oxford University Press, 1998. {{ISBN|0-19-283445-2}}
* Conrad, B. ''Der wahre Shakespeare: Christopher Marlowe''. (German non-Fiction book) 5th Edition, 2016. {{ISBN|978-3957800022}}
* Cornelius R. M. ''Christopher Marlowe's Use of the Bible''u. New York: P. Lang, 1984.
* Marlowe, Christopher. ''Complete Works''. Vol. 3: ''Edward II.'', ed. R. Rowland. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1994. (pp. xxii–xxiii)
* Oz, Avraham, ed. ''Marlowe''. New Casebooks. Houndmills, Basingstoke and London: Palgrave/Macmillan, 2003. {{ISBN|033362498X}}
* Parker, John. ''The Aesthetics of Antichrist: From Christian Drama to Christopher Marlowe''. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2007. {{ISBN|978-0-8014-4519-4}}
* Shepard, Alan. ''Marlowe's Soldiers: Rhetorics of Masculinity in the Age of the Armada'', Ashgate, 2002. {{ISBN|0-7546-0229-X}}
* Sim, James H. ''Dramatic Uses of Biblical Allusions in Marlowe and Shakespeare'', Gainesville: University of Florida Press, 1966.
* {{cite EB9 |wstitle = Marlowe, Christopher |volume= XV | |last= Swinburne |first= Algernon Charles |author-link= Algernon Charles Swinburne | pages=556-558 |short= 1}}
* Wraight A. D.; Stern, Virginia F. ''In Search of Christopher Marlowe: A Pictorial Biography'', London: Macdonald, 1965.
{{refend}}


==External links==
==External links==
{{Sister project links|auto=1|d=y|author=y|commonscat=y}}
{{Commons|Category:Christopher Marlowe|Christopher Marlowe}}
* {{StandardEbooks|Standard Ebooks URL=https://standardebooks.org/ebooks/christopher-marlowe}}
{{wikiquote}}
{{Wikisource author}}
* {{Gutenberg author | id=410}}
* {{Internet Archive author |sname=Christopher Marlowe}}
*[http://www.marlowe-society.org The Marlowe Society]
* {{Librivox author |id=291}}
*[http://www.marlovian.com Marlowe Lives!]
*[http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/Texts/Marlowe.html The works of Marlowe at Perseus Project]
* [http://www.marlowe-society.org/ The Marlowe Society]
* [https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/searchresults?q=Christopher+Marlowe&target=en&collections=Perseus%3Acollection%3AMarlowe The works of Marlowe at Perseus Project]
*{{gutenberg author|id=Christopher_Marlowe|name=Christopher Marlowe}}
* [http://www.rey.prestel.co.uk/ The complete works] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201015023804/http://www.rey.prestel.co.uk/ |date=15 October 2020 }}, with modernised spelling, on Peter Farey's Marlowe page.
*[http://www.matthewgscarsbrook.com-a.googlepages.com/christophermarlowe Matthew G. Scarsbrook's Marlowe Research Page] contains a balanced biography, timeline, descriptions of Marlowe's known associates, and transcripts of all the key Marlowe-related documents
* [http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p003k9d6 BBC audio file]. ''[[In Our Time (BBC Radio 4)|In Our Time]]'' Radio 4 discussion programme on Marlowe and his work
*[http://www.prst17z1.demon.co.uk/ Peter Farey's Marlowe Page] includes a factual [http://www.prst17z1.demon.co.uk/biog.htm biography] and reproduces the documents concerning Marlowe as well as his complete works (but also contains material related to the [[Shakespearean authorship]] question)
* The [https://web.archive.org/web/20121011222157/http://www.marlowebibliography.org/ Marlowe Bibliography Online] is an initiative of the [http://www.marlowesmightyline.org/ Marlowe Society of America] and the [http://www.culture-communication.unimelb.edu.au/study/english University of Melbourne]. Its purpose is to facilitate scholarship on the works of Christopher Marlowe by providing a searchable annotated bibliography of relevant scholarship
*[http://www.masoncode.com/Marlowe%20wrote%20Shakespeare's%20Sonnets.htm Peter Bull] presents a case for Marlowe as the true author of Shakespeare's Sonnets.
* {{UK National Archives ID}}
*[http://www.rosetheatre.org.uk/ The Rose Theatre] where Marlowe made his name
*[http://www.classicistranieri.com/english/indexes/authm.htm Works by Christopher Marlowe] in e-book
*[http://www2.prestel.co.uk/rey/title.htm A Deception in Deptford] A compelling and through exposition of (circumstantial) evidence for the Marlowe-as-Shakespeare theory. Evidence is presented, which suggests:
# That Marlowe was very probably still alive two years after his supposed death in May 1593,
# That his survival would have made possible a collaboration explaining the exceptional influence Marlowe is said to have had upon the works of Shakespeare,
# That Marlowe probably played a major part in such a collaboration.
<!-- Metadata: see [[Wikipedia:Persondata]] -->


{{Christopher Marlowe}}
{{Persondata
{{Edward II}}
|NAME= Marlowe, Christopher
{{authority control}}
|ALTERNATIVE NAMES= Marlowe, Kit
|SHORT DESCRIPTION= English [[playwright]] and [[poet]]
|DATE OF BIRTH= Unknown, baptized [[26 February]] [[1564]]
|PLACE OF BIRTH= [[Canterbury]], [[England]]
|DATE OF DEATH= {{death date|1593|5|30|df=y}}
|PLACE OF DEATH= [[Deptford, London|Deptford]], [[England]]
}}
[[Category:English Renaissance dramatists|Marlowe, Christopher]]
[[Category:English dramatists and playwrights|Marlowe, Christopher]]
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Latest revision as of 22:15, 26 November 2024

Christopher Marlowe
Born
Canterbury, Kent, England
Baptised26 February 1564
Died30 May 1593 (aged 29)
Deptford, Kent, England
Resting placeChurchyard of St. Nicholas, Deptford; unmarked; memorial plaques inside and outside church
Alma materCorpus Christi College, Cambridge
Occupations
  • Playwright
  • poet
Years activec. mid-1580s – 1593
Era
Notable work
MovementEnglish Renaissance
Signature

Christopher Marlowe (/ˈmɑːrl/ MAR-loh; baptised 26 February 1564 – 30 May 1593), also known as Kit Marlowe, was an English playwright, poet, and translator of the Elizabethan era.[a] Marlowe is among the most famous of the Elizabethan playwrights. Based upon the "many imitations" of his play Tamburlaine, modern scholars consider him to have been the foremost dramatist in London in the years just before his mysterious early death.[b] Some scholars also believe that he greatly influenced William Shakespeare, who was baptised in the same year as Marlowe and later succeeded him as the preeminent Elizabethan playwright.[c] Marlowe was the first to achieve critical reputation for his use of blank verse, which became the standard for the era. His plays are distinguished by their overreaching protagonists. Themes found within Marlowe's literary works have been noted as humanistic with realistic emotions, which some scholars find difficult to reconcile with Marlowe's "anti-intellectualism" and his catering to the prurient tastes of his Elizabethan audiences for generous displays of extreme physical violence, cruelty, and bloodshed.[4]

Events in Marlowe's life were sometimes as extreme as those found in his plays.[d] Differing sensational reports of Marlowe's death in 1593 abounded after the event and are contested by scholars today owing to a lack of good documentation. There have been many conjectures as to the nature and reason for his death, including a vicious bar-room fight, blasphemous libel against the church, homosexual intrigue, betrayal by another playwright, and espionage from the highest level: the Privy Council of Elizabeth I. An official coroner's account of Marlowe's death was discovered only in 1925,[6] and it did little to persuade all scholars that it told the whole story, nor did it eliminate the uncertainties present in his biography.[7]

Early life

[edit]
Marlowe was christened at St George's Church, Canterbury. The tower, shown here, is all that survived destruction during the Baedeker air raids of 1942.

Christopher Marlowe, the second of nine children, and oldest child after the death of his sister Mary in 1568, was born to Canterbury shoemaker John Marlowe and his wife Katherine, daughter of William Arthur of Dover.[8] He was baptised at St George's Church, Canterbury, on 26 February 1564 (1563 in the old style dates in use at the time, which placed the new year on 25 March).[9] Marlowe's birth was likely to have been a few days before,[10][11][12] making him about two months older than William Shakespeare, who was baptised on 26 April 1564 in Stratford-upon-Avon.[13]

By age 14, Marlowe was a pupil at The King's School, Canterbury on a scholarship[e] and two years later a student at Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, where he also studied through a scholarship with expectation that he would become an Anglican clergyman.[14] Instead, he received his Bachelor of Arts degree in 1584.[8][15] Marlowe mastered Latin during his schooling, reading and translating the works of Ovid. In 1587, the university hesitated to award his Master of Arts degree because of a rumour that he intended to go to the English seminary at Rheims in northern France, presumably to prepare for ordination as a Roman Catholic priest.[8] If true, such an action on his part would have been a direct violation of royal edict issued by Queen Elizabeth I in 1585 criminalising any attempt by an English citizen to be ordained in the Roman Catholic Church.[16][17]

Large-scale violence between Protestants and Catholics on the European continent has been cited by scholars as the impetus for the Protestant English Queen's defensive anti-Catholic laws issued from 1581 until her death in 1603.[16] Despite the dire implications for Marlowe, his degree was awarded on schedule when the Privy Council intervened on his behalf, commending him for his "faithful dealing" and "good service" to the Queen.[18] The nature of Marlowe's service was not specified by the council, but its letter to the Cambridge authorities has provoked much speculation by modern scholars, notably the theory that Marlowe was operating as a secret agent for Privy Council member Sir Francis Walsingham.[19] The only surviving evidence of the Privy Council's correspondence is found in their minutes, the letter being lost. There is no mention of espionage in the minutes, but its summation of the lost Privy Council letter is vague in meaning, stating that "it was not Her Majesties pleasure" that persons employed as Marlowe had been "in matters touching the benefit of his country should be defamed by those who are ignorant in th'affaires he went about." Scholars agree the vague wording was typically used to protect government agents, but they continue to debate what the "matters touching the benefit of his country" actually were in Marlowe's case and how they affected the 23-year-old writer as he began his literary career in 1587.[8]

Adult life and legend

[edit]

Little is known about Marlowe's adult life. All available evidence, other than what can be deduced from his literary works, is found in legal records and other official documents. Writers of fiction and non-fiction have speculated about his professional activities, private life, and character. Marlowe has been described as a spy, a brawler, and a heretic, as well as a "magician", "duellist", "tobacco-user", "counterfeiter" and "rakehell". While J. A. Downie and Constance Kuriyama have argued against the more lurid speculations, J. B. Steane remarked, "it seems absurd to dismiss all of these Elizabethan rumours and accusations as 'the Marlowe myth'".[20][21][22] Much has been written on his brief adult life, including speculation of: his involvement in royally sanctioned espionage; his vocal declaration of atheism; his (possibly same-sex) sexual interests; and the puzzling circumstances surrounding his death.

Spying

[edit]
The corner of Old Court of Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, where Marlowe stayed while a Cambridge student and, possibly, during the time he was recruited as a spy

Marlowe is alleged to have been a government spy.[23] Park Honan and Charles Nicholl speculate that this was the case and suggest that Marlowe's recruitment took place when he was at Cambridge.[23][24] In 1587, when the Privy Council ordered the University of Cambridge to award Marlowe his degree as Master of Arts, it denied rumours that he intended to go to the English Catholic college in Rheims, saying instead that he had been engaged in unspecified "affaires" on "matters touching the benefit of his country".[25] Surviving college records from the period also indicate that, in the academic year 1584–1585, Marlowe had had a series of unusually lengthy absences from the university which violated university regulations. Surviving college buttery accounts, which record student purchases for personal provisions, show that Marlowe began spending lavishly on food and drink during the periods he was in attendance; the amount was more than he could have afforded on his known scholarship income.[26][f]

Portrait of alleged "spymaster" Sir Francis Walsingham c. 1585; attributed to John de Critz

It has been speculated that Marlowe was the "Morley" who was tutor to Arbella Stuart in 1589.[g] This possibility was first raised in a Times Literary Supplement letter by E. St John Brooks in 1937; in a letter to Notes and Queries, John Baker has added that only Marlowe could have been Arbella's tutor owing to the absence of any other known "Morley" from the period with an MA and not otherwise occupied.[30] If Marlowe was Arbella's tutor, it might indicate that he was there as a spy, since Arbella, niece of Mary, Queen of Scots, and cousin of James VI of Scotland, later James I of England, was at the time a strong candidate for the succession to Elizabeth's throne.[31][32][33][34] Frederick S. Boas dismisses the possibility of this identification, based on surviving legal records which document Marlowe's "residence in London between September and December 1589". Marlowe had been party to a fatal quarrel involving his neighbours and the poet Thomas Watson in Norton Folgate and was held in Newgate Prison for a fortnight.[35] In fact, the quarrel and his arrest occurred on 18 September, he was released on bail on 1 October and he had to attend court, where he was acquitted on 3 December, but there is no record of where he was for the intervening two months.[36]

In 1592 Marlowe was arrested in the English garrison town of Flushing (Vlissingen) in the Netherlands, for alleged involvement in the counterfeiting of coins, presumably related to the activities of seditious Catholics. He was sent to the Lord Treasurer (Burghley), but no charge or imprisonment resulted.[37] This arrest may have disrupted another of Marlowe's spying missions, perhaps by giving the resulting coinage to the Catholic cause. He was to infiltrate the followers of the active Catholic plotter William Stanley and report back to Burghley.[38]

Philosophy

[edit]
Sir Walter Raleigh, shown here in 1588, was the alleged centre of the "School of Atheism" c. 1592.

Marlowe was reputed to be an atheist, which held the dangerous implication of being an enemy of God and, by association, the state.[39] With the rise of public fears concerning The School of Night, or "School of Atheism" in the late 16th century, accusations of atheism were closely associated with disloyalty to the Protestant monarchy of England.[40]

Some modern historians consider that Marlowe's professed atheism, as with his supposed Catholicism, may have been no more than a sham to further his work as a government spy.[41] Contemporary evidence comes from Marlowe's accuser in Flushing, an informer called Richard Baines. The governor of Flushing had reported that each of the men had "of malice" accused the other of instigating the counterfeiting and of intending to go over to the Catholic "enemy"; such an action was considered atheistic by the Church of England. Following Marlowe's arrest in 1593, Baines submitted to the authorities a "note containing the opinion of one Christopher Marly concerning his damnable judgment of religion, and scorn of God's word".[42] Baines attributes to Marlowe a total of eighteen items which "scoff at the pretensions of the Old and New Testament" such as, "Christ was a bastard and his mother dishonest [unchaste]", "the woman of Samaria and her sister were whores and that Christ knew them dishonestly", "St John the Evangelist was bedfellow to Christ and leaned always in his bosom" (cf. John 13:23–25) and "that he used him as the sinners of Sodom".[22] He also implied that Marlowe had Catholic sympathies. Other passages are merely sceptical in tone: "he persuades men to atheism, willing them not to be afraid of bugbears and hobgoblins". The final paragraph of Baines's document reads:

Portrait often claimed to be Thomas Harriot (1602), which hangs in Trinity College, Oxford

These thinges, with many other shall by good & honest witnes be approved to be his opinions and Comon Speeches, and that this Marlowe doth not only hould them himself, but almost into every Company he Cometh he persuades men to Atheism willing them not to be afeard of bugbeares and hobgoblins, and vtterly scorning both god and his ministers as I Richard Baines will Justify & approue both by mine oth and the testimony of many honest men, and almost al men with whome he hath Conversed any time will testify the same, and as I think all men in Cristianity ought to indevor that the mouth of so dangerous a member may be stopped, he saith likewise that he hath quoted a number of Contrarieties oute of the Scripture which he hath giuen to some great men who in Convenient time shalbe named. When these thinges shalbe Called in question the witnes shalbe produced.[43]

Similar examples of Marlowe's statements were given by Thomas Kyd after his imprisonment and possible torture (see above); Kyd and Baines connect Marlowe with mathematician Thomas Harriot's and Sir Walter Raleigh's circle.[44] Another document claimed about that time that "one Marlowe is able to show more sound reasons for Atheism than any divine in England is able to give to prove divinity, and that ... he hath read the Atheist lecture to Sir Walter Raleigh and others".[22][h]

Some critics believe that Marlowe sought to disseminate these views in his work and that he identified with his rebellious and iconoclastic protagonists.[46] Plays had to be approved by the Master of the Revels before they could be performed and the censorship of publications was under the control of the Archbishop of Canterbury. Presumably these authorities did not consider any of Marlowe's works to be unacceptable other than the Amores.

Sexuality

[edit]
Title page to 1598 edition of Marlowe's Hero and Leander

It has been claimed that Marlowe was homosexual. Some scholars argue that the identification of an Elizabethan as gay or homosexual in the modern sense is "anachronistic," saying that for the Elizabethans the terms were more likely to have been applied to homoerotic affections or sexual acts rather than to what we currently understand as a settled sexual orientation or personal role identity.[47] Other scholars argue that the evidence is inconclusive and that the reports of Marlowe's homosexuality may be rumours produced after his death. Richard Baines reported Marlowe as saying: "all they that love not Tobacco & Boies were fools". David Bevington and Eric C. Rasmussen describe Baines's evidence as "unreliable testimony" and "[t]hese and other testimonials need to be discounted for their exaggeration and for their having been produced under legal circumstances we would now regard as a witch-hunt".[48]

Literary scholar J. B. Steane considered there to be "no evidence for Marlowe's homosexuality at all".[22] Other scholars point to the frequency with which Marlowe explores homosexual themes in his writing: in Hero and Leander, Marlowe writes of the male youth Leander: "in his looks were all that men desire..."[49][50] Edward the Second contains the following passage enumerating homosexual relationships:

The mightiest kings have had their minions;
Great Alexander loved Hephaestion,
The conquering Hercules for Hylas wept;
And for Patroclus, stern Achilles drooped.
And not kings only, but the wisest men:
The Roman Tully loved Octavius,
Grave Socrates, wild Alcibiades.[51]

Marlowe wrote the only play about the life of Edward II up to his time, taking the humanist literary discussion of male sexuality much further than his contemporaries. The play was extremely bold, dealing with a star-crossed love story between Edward II and Piers Gaveston. Though it was a common practice at the time to reveal characters as homosexual to give audiences reason to suspect them as culprits in a crime, Christopher Marlowe's Edward II is portrayed as a sympathetic character.[52] The decision to start the play Dido, Queen of Carthage with a homoerotic scene between Jupiter and Ganymede that bears no connection to the subsequent plot has long puzzled scholars.[53]

Arrest and death

[edit]
Marlowe was buried in an unmarked grave in the churchyard of St Nicholas, Deptford. This modern plaque is on the east wall of the churchyard.

In early May 1593, several bills were posted about London threatening the Protestant refugees from France and the Netherlands who had settled in the city. One of these, the "Dutch church libel", written in rhymed iambic pentameter, contained allusions to several of Marlowe's plays and was signed, "Tamburlaine".[54] On 11 May 1593 the Privy Council ordered the arrest of those responsible for the libels. The next day, Marlowe's colleague Thomas Kyd was arrested, his lodgings were searched and a three-page fragment of a heretical tract was found. In a letter to Sir John Puckering, Kyd asserted that it had belonged to Marlowe, with whom he had been writing "in one chamber" some two years earlier.[44][i] In a second letter, Kyd described Marlowe as blasphemous, disorderly, holding treasonous opinions, being an irreligious reprobate and "intemperate & of a cruel hart".[55] They had both been working for an aristocratic patron, probably Ferdinando Stanley, Lord Strange.[55] A warrant for Marlowe's arrest was issued on 18 May 1593, when the Privy Council apparently knew that he might be found staying with Thomas Walsingham, whose father was a first cousin of the late Sir Francis Walsingham, Elizabeth's principal secretary in the 1580s and a man more deeply involved in state espionage than any other member of the Privy Council.[56] Marlowe duly presented himself on 20 May 1593 but there apparently being no Privy Council meeting on that day, was instructed to "give his daily attendance on their Lordships, until he shall be licensed to the contrary".[57] On Wednesday, 30 May 1593, Marlowe was killed.

Title page to the 1598 edition of Palladis Tamia by Francis Meres, which contains one of the earliest descriptions of Marlowe's death

Various accounts of Marlowe's death were current over the next few years. In his Palladis Tamia, published in 1598, Francis Meres says Marlowe was "stabbed to death by a bawdy serving-man, a rival of his in his lewd love" as punishment for his "epicurism and atheism".[58] In 1917, in the Dictionary of National Biography, Sir Sidney Lee wrote, on slender evidence, that Marlowe was killed in a drunken fight. His claim was not much at variance with the official account, which came to light only in 1925, when the scholar Leslie Hotson discovered the coroner's report of the inquest on Marlowe's death, held two days later on Friday 1 June 1593, by the Coroner of the Queen's Household, William Danby.[6] Marlowe had spent all day in a house in Deptford, owned by the widow Eleanor Bull, with three men: Ingram Frizer, Nicholas Skeres and Robert Poley. All three had been employed by one or other of the Walsinghams. Skeres and Poley had helped snare the conspirators in the Babington plot, and Frizer was a servant[59] to Thomas Walsingham, probably acting as a financial or business agent, as he was for Walsingham's wife Audrey a few years later.[60][61] These witnesses testified that Frizer and Marlowe had argued over payment of the bill (now famously known as the "Reckoning"), exchanging "divers malicious words", while Frizer was sitting at a table between the other two and Marlowe was lying behind him on a couch. Marlowe snatched Frizer's dagger and wounded him on the head. According to the coroner's report, in the ensuing struggle Marlowe was stabbed above the right eye, killing him instantly. The jury concluded that Frizer acted in self-defence and within a month he was pardoned. Marlowe was buried in an unmarked grave in the churchyard of St. Nicholas, Deptford, immediately after the inquest, on 1 June 1593.[62]

The complete text of the inquest report was published by Leslie Hotson in his book, The Death of Christopher Marlowe, in the introduction to which Professor George Lyman Kittredge wrote: "The mystery of Marlowe's death, heretofore involved in a cloud of contradictory gossip and irresponsible guess-work, is now cleared up for good and all on the authority of public records of complete authenticity and gratifying fullness". However, this confidence proved to be fairly short-lived. Hotson had considered the possibility that the witnesses had "concocted a lying account of Marlowe's behaviour, to which they swore at the inquest, and with which they deceived the jury", but decided against that scenario.[63] Others began to suspect that this theory was indeed the case. Writing to the Times Literary Supplement shortly after the book's publication, Eugénie de Kalb disputed that the struggle and outcome as described were even possible, and Samuel A. Tannenbaum insisted the following year that such a wound could not have possibly resulted in instant death, as had been claimed.[64][65] Even Marlowe's biographer John Bakeless acknowledged that "some scholars have been inclined to question the truthfulness of the coroner's report. There is something queer about the whole episode", and said that Hotson's discovery "raises almost as many questions as it answers".[66] It has also been discovered more recently that the apparent absence of a local county coroner to accompany the Coroner of the Queen's Household would, if noticed, have made the inquest null and void.[67]

One of the main reasons for doubting the truth of the inquest concerns the reliability of Marlowe's companions as witnesses.[68] As an agent provocateur for the late Sir Francis Walsingham, Robert Poley was a consummate liar, the "very genius of the Elizabethan underworld", and was on record as saying "I will swear and forswear myself, rather than I will accuse myself to do me any harm".[69][70] The other witness, Nicholas Skeres, had for many years acted as a confidence trickster, drawing young men into the clutches of people involved in the money-lending racket, including Marlowe's apparent killer, Ingram Frizer, with whom he was engaged in such a swindle.[71] Despite their being referred to as generosi (gentlemen) in the inquest report, the witnesses were professional liars. Some biographers, such as Kuriyama and Downie, take the inquest to be a true account of what occurred, but in trying to explain what really happened if the account was not true, others have come up with a variety of murder theories:[72][73]

  • Jealous of her husband Thomas's relationship with Marlowe, Audrey Walsingham arranged for the playwright to be murdered.[64]
  • Sir Walter Raleigh arranged the murder, fearing that under torture Marlowe might incriminate him.[74]
  • With Skeres the main player, the murder resulted from attempts by the Earl of Essex to use Marlowe to incriminate Sir Walter Raleigh.[75]
  • He was killed on the orders of father and son Lord Burghley and Sir Robert Cecil, who thought that his plays contained Catholic propaganda.[76]
  • He was accidentally killed while Frizer and Skeres were pressuring him to pay back money he owed them.[77]
  • Marlowe was murdered at the behest of several members of the Privy Council, who feared that he might reveal them to be atheists.[78]
  • The Queen ordered his assassination because of his subversive atheistic behaviour.[79]
  • Frizer murdered him because he envied Marlowe's close relationship with his master Thomas Walsingham and feared the effect that Marlowe's behaviour might have on Walsingham's reputation.[80]
  • Marlowe's death was faked to save him from trial and execution for subversive atheism.[j]

Since there are only written documents on which to base any conclusions, and since it is probable that the most crucial information about his death was never committed to paper, it is unlikely that the full circumstances of Marlowe's death will ever be known.

Reputation among contemporary writers

[edit]
Ben Jonson, leading satirist of the Elizabethan and Jacobean eras, was one of the first to acknowledge Marlowe for the power of his dramatic verse.
Ben Jonson, leading satirist of the Elizabethan and Jacobean eras, was one of the first to acknowledge Marlowe for the power of his dramatic verse.

For his contemporaries in the literary world, Marlowe was above all an admired and influential artist. Within weeks of his death, George Peele remembered him as "Marley, the Muses' darling"; Michael Drayton noted that he "Had in him those brave translunary things / That the first poets had" and Ben Jonson even wrote of "Marlowe's mighty line".[82] Thomas Nashe wrote warmly of his friend, "poor deceased Kit Marlowe," as did the publisher Edward Blount in his dedication of Hero and Leander to Sir Thomas Walsingham. Among the few contemporary dramatists to say anything negative about Marlowe was the anonymous author of the Cambridge University play The Return from Parnassus (1598) who wrote, "Pity it is that wit so ill should dwell, / Wit lent from heaven, but vices sent from hell".

The most famous tribute to Marlowe was paid by Shakespeare in As You Like It, where he not only quotes a line from Hero and Leander ("Dead Shepherd, now I find thy saw of might, 'Who ever lov'd that lov'd not at first sight?'") but also gives to the clown Touchstone the words "When a man's verses cannot be understood, nor a man's good wit seconded with the forward child, understanding, it strikes a man more dead than a great reckoning in a little room."[83] This appears to be a reference to Marlowe's murder which involved a fight over the "reckoning," the bill, as well as to a line in Marlowe's Jew of Malta, "Infinite riches in a little room."

The influence of Marlowe upon William Shakespeare is evidenced by the Marlovian themes and other allusions to Marlowe found in Shakespeare's plays and sonnets.
The influence of Marlowe upon William Shakespeare is evidenced by the Marlovian themes and other allusions to Marlowe found in Shakespeare's plays and sonnets.

Shakespeare was much influenced by Marlowe in his work, as can be seen in the use of Marlovian themes in Antony and Cleopatra, The Merchant of Venice, Richard II and Macbeth (Dido, Jew of Malta, Edward II and Doctor Faustus, respectively). In Hamlet, after meeting with the travelling actors, Hamlet requests the Player perform a speech about the Trojan War, which at 2.2.429–432 has an echo of Marlowe's Dido, Queen of Carthage. In Love's Labour's Lost Shakespeare brings on a character "Marcade" (three syllables) in conscious acknowledgement of Marlowe's character "Mercury", also attending the King of Navarre, in Massacre at Paris. The significance, to those of Shakespeare's audience who were familiar with Hero and Leander, was Marlowe's identification of himself with the god Mercury.[84]

Shakespeare authorship theory

[edit]

An argument has arisen about the notion that Marlowe faked his death and then continued to write under the assumed name of William Shakespeare. Academic consensus rejects alternative candidates for authorship of Shakespeare's plays and sonnets, including Marlowe.[85]

Literary career

[edit]
Edward Alleyn, lead actor of Lord Strange's Men was possibly the first to play the title characters in Doctor Faustus, Tamburlaine, and The Jew of Malta.
Edward Alleyn, lead actor of Lord Strange's Men was possibly the first to play the title characters in Doctor Faustus, Tamburlaine, and The Jew of Malta.

Plays

[edit]

Six dramas have been attributed to the authorship of Christopher Marlowe either alone or in collaboration with other writers, with varying degrees of evidence. The writing sequence or chronology of these plays is mostly unknown and is offered here with any dates and evidence known. Among the little available information we have, Dido is believed to be the first Marlowe play performed, while it was Tamburlaine that was first to be performed on a regular commercial stage in London in 1587. Believed by many scholars to be Marlowe's greatest success, Tamburlaine was the first English play written in blank verse and, with Thomas Kyd's The Spanish Tragedy, is generally considered the beginning of the mature phase of the Elizabethan theatre.[86]

The play Lust's Dominion was attributed to Marlowe upon its initial publication in 1657, though scholars and critics have almost unanimously rejected the attribution. He may also have written or co-written Arden of Faversham.

Ferdinando Stanley, 5th Earl of Derby, aka "Ferdinando, Lord Straunge," was patron of some of Marlowe's early plays as performed by Lord Strange's Men.
Ferdinando Stanley, 5th Earl of Derby, aka "Ferdinando, Lord Straunge," was patron of some of Marlowe's early plays as performed by Lord Strange's Men.

Poetry and translations

[edit]

Publication and responses to the poetry and translations credited to Marlowe primarily occurred posthumously, including:

Collaborations

[edit]

Modern scholars still look for evidence of collaborations between Marlowe and other writers. In 2016, one publisher was the first to endorse the scholarly claim of a collaboration between Marlowe and the playwright William Shakespeare:

  • Henry VI by William Shakespeare is now credited as a collaboration with Marlowe in the New Oxford Shakespeare series, published in 2016. Marlowe appears as co-author of the three Henry VI plays, though some scholars doubt any actual collaboration.[90][91][92][93]
Charles Howard, 1st Earl of Nottingham, Lord High Admiral, shown here c. 1601 in a procession for Elizabeth I of England, was patron of the Admiral's Men during Marlowe's lifetime.

Contemporary reception

[edit]

Marlowe's plays were enormously successful, possibly because of the imposing stage presence of his lead actor, Edward Alleyn. Alleyn was unusually tall for the time and the haughty roles of Tamburlaine, Faustus and Barabas were probably written for him. Marlowe's plays were the foundation of the repertoire of Alleyn's company, the Admiral's Men, throughout the 1590s. One of Marlowe's poetry translations did not fare as well. In 1599, Marlowe's translation of Ovid was banned and copies were publicly burned as part of Archbishop Whitgift's crackdown on offensive material.

Chronology of dramatic works

[edit]

(Patrick Cheney's 2004 Cambridge Companion to Christopher Marlowe presents an alternative timeline based upon printing dates.)[94]

Dido, Queen of Carthage (c. 1585–1587)

[edit]
Title page of the 1594 first edition of Dido, Queen of Carthage

First official record 1594

First published 1594; posthumously

First recorded performance between 1587 and 1593 by the Children of the Chapel, a company of boy actors in London.[95]

Significance This play is believed by many scholars to be the first play by Christopher Marlowe to be performed.

Attribution The title page attributes the play to Marlowe and Thomas Nashe, yet some scholars question how much of a contribution Nashe made to the play.[96][97]

Evidence No manuscripts by Marlowe exist for this play.[98]

Tamburlaine, Part I (c. 1587); Part II (c. 1587–1588)

[edit]
Title page of the earliest published edition of Tamburlaine (1590)

First official record 1587, Part I

First published 1590, Parts I and II in one octavo, London. No author named.[99]

First recorded performance 1587, Part I, by the Admiral's Men, London.[k]

Significance Tamburlaine is the first example of blank verse used in the dramatic literature of the Early Modern English theatre.

Attribution Author name is missing from first printing in 1590. Attribution of this work by scholars to Marlowe is based upon comparison to his other verified works. Passages and character development in Tamburlane are similar to many other Marlowe works.[101]

Evidence No manuscripts by Marlowe exist for this play.[102] Parts I and II were entered into the Stationers' Register on 14 August 1590. The two parts were published together by the London printer, Richard Jones, in 1590; a second edition in 1592, and a third in 1597. The 1597 edition of the two parts were published separately in quarto by Edward White; part I in 1605, and part II in 1606.[86][99]

The Jew of Malta (c. 1589–1590)

[edit]
The Jew of Malta title page from 1633 quarto

First official record 1592

First published 1592; earliest extant edition, 1633

First recorded performance 26 February 1592, by Lord Strange's acting company.[103]

Significance The performances of the play were a success and it remained popular for the next fifty years. This play helps to establish the strong theme of "anti-authoritarianism" that is found throughout Marlowe's works.

Evidence No manuscripts by Marlowe exist for this play.[102] The play was entered in the Stationers' Register on 17 May 1594 but the earliest surviving printed edition is from 1633.

Doctor Faustus (c. 1588–1592)

[edit]
Frontispiece to a 1631 printing of Doctor Faustus showing Faustus conjuring Mephistophilis

First official record 1594–1597[104]

First published 1601, no extant copy; first extant copy, 1604 (A text) quarto; 1616 (B text) quarto.[105]

First recorded performance 1594–1597; 24 revival performances occurred between these years by the Lord Admiral's Company, Rose Theatre, London; earlier performances probably occurred around 1589 by the same company.[104]

Significance This is the first dramatised version of the Faust legend of a scholar's dealing with the devil. Marlowe deviates from earlier versions of "The Devil's Pact" significantly: Marlowe's protagonist is unable to "burn his books" or repent to a merciful God to have his contract annulled at the end of the play; he is carried off by demons; and, in the 1616 quarto, his mangled corpse is found by the scholar characters.

Attribution The 'B text' was highly edited and censored, owing in part to the shifting theatre laws regarding religious words onstage during the seventeenth-century. Because it contains several additional scenes believed to be the additions of other playwrights, particularly Samuel Rowley and William Bird (alias Borne), a recent edition attributes the authorship of both versions to "Christopher Marlowe and his collaborator and revisers." This recent edition has tried to establish that the 'A text' was assembled from Marlowe's work and another writer, with the 'B text' as a later revision.[104][106]

Evidence No manuscripts by Marlowe exist for this play.[102] The two earliest-printed extant versions of the play, A and B, form a textual problem for scholars. Both were published after Marlowe's death and scholars disagree which text is more representative of Marlowe's original. Some editions are based on a combination of the two texts. Late-twentieth-century scholarly consensus identifies 'A text' as more representative because it contains irregular character names and idiosyncratic spelling, which are believed to reflect the author's handwritten manuscript or "foul papers". In comparison, 'B text' is highly edited with several additional scenes possibly written by other playwrights.[105]

Edward the Second (c. 1592)

[edit]
Title page of the earliest published text of Edward II (1594)

First official record 1593[107]

First published 1590; earliest extant edition 1594 octavo[107]

First recorded performance 1592, performed by the Earl of Pembroke's Men.[107]

Significance Considered by recent scholars as Marlowe's "most modern play" because of its probing treatment of the private life of a king and unflattering depiction of the power politics of the time.[108] The 1594 editions of Edward II and of Dido are the first published plays with Marlowe's name appearing as the author.[107]

Attribution Earliest extant edition of 1594.[107]

Evidence The play was entered into the Stationers' Register on 6 July 1593, five weeks after Marlowe's death.[107]

The Massacre at Paris (c. 1589–1593)

[edit]
Title page to a rare extant printed copy of The Massacre at Paris by Christopher Marlowe; undated.
Alleged foul sheet from Marlowe's writing of The Massacre at Paris (1593). Reproduced from Folger Shakespeare Library Ms.J.b.8. Recent scholars consider this manuscript part of a "reconstruction" by another hand.

First official record c. 1593, alleged foul sheet by Marlowe of "Scene 19"; although authorship by Marlowe is contested by recent scholars, the manuscript is believed written while the play was first performed and with an unknown purpose.

First published undated, c. 1594 or later, octavo, London;[109] while this is the most complete surviving text, it is near half the length of Marlowe's other works and possibly a reconstruction.[102] The printer and publisher credit, "E.A. for Edward White," also appears on the 1605/06 printing of Marlowe's Tamburlaine.[109]

First recorded performance 26 Jan 1593, by Lord Strange's Men, at Henslowe's Rose Theatre, London, under the title The Tragedy of the Guise;[109] 1594, in the repertory of the Admiral's Men.[102]

Significance The Massacre at Paris is considered Marlowe's most dangerous play, as agitators in London seized on its theme to advocate the murders of refugees from the low countries of the Spanish Netherlands, and it warns Elizabeth I of this possibility in its last scene.[110][111] It features the silent "English Agent", whom tradition has identified with Marlowe and his connexions to the secret service.[112] Highest grossing play for Lord Strange's Men in 1593.[113]

Attribution A 1593 loose manuscript sheet of the play, called a foul sheet, is alleged to be by Marlowe and has been claimed by some scholars as the only extant play manuscript by the author. It could also provide an approximate date of composition for the play. When compared with the extant printed text and his other work, other scholars reject the attribution to Marlowe. The only surviving printed text of this play is possibly a reconstruction from memory of Marlowe's original performance text. Current scholarship notes that there are only 1147 lines in the play, half the amount of a typical play of the 1590s. Other evidence that the extant published text may not be Marlowe's original is the uneven style throughout, with two-dimensional characterisations, deteriorating verbal quality and repetitions of content.[114]

Evidence Never appeared in the Stationer's Register.[115]

Memorials

[edit]
The Muse of Poetry, part of the Marlowe Memorial in Canterbury
The Muse of Poetry, part of the Marlowe Memorial in Canterbury

The Muse of Poetry, a bronze sculpture by Edward Onslow Ford references Marlowe and his work. It was erected on Buttermarket, Canterbury in 1891, and now stands outside the Marlowe Theatre in the city.[116][117]

In July 2002, a memorial window to Marlowe was unveiled by the Marlowe Society at Poets' Corner in Westminster Abbey.[118] Controversially, a question mark was added to his generally accepted date of death.[119] On 25 October 2011 a letter from Paul Edmondson and Stanley Wells was published by The Times newspaper, in which they called on the Dean and Chapter to remove the question mark on the grounds that it "flew in the face of a mass of unimpugnable evidence". In 2012, they renewed this call in their e-book Shakespeare Bites Back, adding that it "denies history" and again the following year in their book Shakespeare Beyond Doubt.[120][121]

The Marlowe Theatre in Canterbury, Kent, UK, was named for Marlowe in 1949.[117]

Marlowe in fiction

[edit]

Marlowe has been used as a character in books, theatre, film, television, games and radio.

Modern compendia

[edit]

Modern scholarly collected works of Marlowe include:

  • The Complete Works of Christopher Marlowe (edited by Roma Gill in 1986; Clarendon Press published in partnership with Oxford University Press)
  • The Complete Plays of Christopher Marlowe (edited by J. B. Steane in 1969; edited by Frank Romany and Robert Lindsey, Revised Edition, 2004, Penguin)

Works of Marlowe in performance

[edit]
Poster for the 1937, New York WPA Federal Theatre Project production of Doctor Faustus

Radio

[edit]
  • BBC Radio broadcast adaptations of Marlowe's six plays from May to October 1993.[122]

Royal Shakespeare Company

[edit]

Royal Shakespeare Company

Royal National Theatre

[edit]

Royal National Theatre

Shakespeare's Globe

[edit]

Shakespeare's Globe

  • Dido, Queen of Carthage, directed by Tim Carroll, with Rakie Ayola as Dido, 2003.[137]
  • Edward II, directed by Timothy Walker, with Liam Brennan as Edward, 2003.[138]

Malthouse Theatre

[edit]

The Marlowe Sessions[139][140]

Other stage

[edit]

Stage adaptations

[edit]

Film

[edit]

Notes

[edit]
  1. ^ "Christopher Marlowe was baptised as 'Marlow,' but he spelled his name 'Marley' in his one known surviving signature."[1]
  2. ^ "During Marlowe's lifetime, the popularity of his plays, Robert Greene's unintentionally elevating remarks about him as a dramatist in A Groatsworth of Wit, including the designation 'famous', and the many imitations of Tamburlaine suggest that he was for a brief time considered England's foremost dramatist." Logan also suggests consulting the business diary of Philip Henslowe, which is traditionally used by theatre historians to determine the popularity of Marlowe's plays.[2]
  3. ^ No birth records, only baptismal records, have been found for Marlowe and Shakespeare, therefore any reference to a birthdate for either man probably refers to the date of their baptism.[3]
  4. ^ "...as one of the most influential current critics, Stephen Greenblatt frets, Marlowe's 'cruel, aggressive plays' seem to reflect a life also lived on the edge: 'a courting of disaster as reckless as any that he depicted on stage'."[5]
  5. ^ The earliest record of Marlowe at The King's School is their payment for his scholarship of 1578/79, but Nicholl notes this was "unusually late" to start as a student and proposes he could have begun school earlier as a "fee-paying pupil".[8]
  6. ^ It is known that some poorer students worked as labourers on the Corpus Christi College chapel, then under construction, and were paid by the college with extra food. It has been suggested this may be the reason for the sums noted in Marlowe's entry in the buttery accounts.[27]
  7. ^ He was described by Arbella's guardian, the Countess of Shrewsbury, as having hoped for an annuity of some £40 from Arbella, his being "so much damnified (i.e. having lost this much) by leaving the University."[28][29]
  8. ^ The so-called 'Remembrances' against Richard Cholmeley.[45]
  9. ^ J. R. Mulryne states in his ODNB article[clarification needed] that the document was identified in the 20th century as transcripts from John Proctour's The Fall of the Late Arian (1549).[citation needed]
  10. ^ "Useful research has been stimulated by the infinitesimally thin possibility that Marlowe did not die when we think he did. ... History holds its doors open."[81]
  11. ^ Performing company is listed on the title page of the 1590 octavo. Henslowe's diary first lists Tamburlaine performances in 1593, so the original playhouse is unknown.[100]

References

[edit]
  1. ^ Kathman, David. "The Spelling and Pronunciation of Shakespeare's Name: Pronunciation". shakespeareauthorship.com. Archived from the original on 27 November 2020. Retrieved 14 June 2020.
  2. ^ Logan (2007), pp. 4–5, 21.
  3. ^ Logan (2007), pp. 3, 231–235.
  4. ^ Wilson (1999), p. 3.
  5. ^ Wilson (1999), p. 4.
  6. ^ a b "Peter Farey's Marlowe page". Archived from the original on 22 June 2015. Retrieved 30 April 2015.
  7. ^ Erne, Lukas (August 2005). "Biography, Mythography, and Criticism: The Life and Works of Christopher Marlowe". Modern Philology. 103 (1). University of Chicago Press: 28–50. doi:10.1086/499177. S2CID 170152766. Archived from the original on 3 June 2021. Retrieved 1 January 2023.
  8. ^ a b c d e Nicholl, Charles (2004). "Marlowe [Marley], Christopher". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (January 2008 ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/18079. Retrieved 10 June 2020. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
  9. ^ Cowper, Joseph Meadows, ed. (1891). The register booke of the parish of St. George the Martyr, within the citie of Canterburie, of christenings, marriages and burials. 1538–1800. Canterbury: Cross & Jackman. p. 10. Archived from the original on 28 July 2020. Retrieved 16 June 2020.
  10. ^ Hopkins, L. (2005). A Christopher Marlowe Chronology. Springer. p. 27. ISBN 978-0-230-50304-5. Archived from the original on 4 September 2022. Retrieved 14 July 2021.
  11. ^ Rackham, Oliver (2014). "The Pseudo-Marlowe Portrait: a wish fulfilled?" (PDF). Corpus Letter (93). Corpus Christi College, Cambridge: 32. Archived (PDF) from the original on 23 October 2021. Retrieved 7 June 2021.
  12. ^ Hilton, Della (1977). Who was Kit Marlowe? : The story of the poet and playwright. New York : Taplinger Pub. Co. p. 1. ISBN 978-0-8008-8291-4.
  13. ^ Holland, Peter (2004). "Shakespeare, William". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (January 2013 ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/25200. Archived from the original on 24 October 2016. Retrieved 27 May 2020. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
  14. ^ Marlowe, C.; Guy-Bray, S.; Wiggins, M.; Lindsey, R. (2014). Edward II Revised. Bloomsbury Publishing. p. 8. ISBN 978-1-4725-7540-1. Retrieved 19 January 2023.
  15. ^ "Marlowe, Christopher (MRLW580C)". A Cambridge Alumni Database. University of Cambridge.
  16. ^ a b Collinson, Patrick (2004). "Elizabeth I". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (January 2012 ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/8636. Archived from the original on 19 August 2021. Retrieved 27 May 2020. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
  17. ^ "Act Against Jesuits and Seminarists (1585), 27 Elizabeth, Cap. 2, Documents Illustrative of English Church History". Macmillan (1896). Archived from the original on 20 September 2020. Retrieved 27 May 2020.
  18. ^ For a full transcript, see Peter Farey's Marlowe page Archived 23 December 2016 at the Wayback Machine (Retrieved 30 April 2015).
  19. ^ Hutchinson, Robert (2006). Elizabeth's Spy Master: Francis Walsingham and the Secret War that Saved England. London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson. p. 111. ISBN 978-0-297-84613-0.
  20. ^ Kuriyama (2002), p. [page needed].
  21. ^ Downie & Parnell (2000), p. [page needed].
  22. ^ a b c d Steane, J. B. (1969). Introduction to Christopher Marlowe: The Complete Plays. Aylesbury, UK: Penguin. ISBN 978-0-14-043037-0.
  23. ^ a b Honan (2005), p. [page needed].
  24. ^ Nicholl (1992), "12".
  25. ^ This is from a document dated 29 June 1587, from the National Archives – Acts of Privy Council.
  26. ^ Nicholl (1992), p. [page needed].
  27. ^ Riggs, David (2004a). The World of Christopher Marlowe. Faber. p. 65. ISBN 978-0-571-22159-2.
  28. ^ British Library Lansdowne MS. 71, f.3.
  29. ^ Nicholl (1992), pp. 340–342.
  30. ^ John Baker, letter to Notes and Queries 44.3 (1997), pp. 367–368
  31. ^ Kuriyama (2002), p. 89.
  32. ^ Nicholl (1992), p. 342.
  33. ^ Handover, P. M. (1957). Arbella Stuart, royal lady of Hardwick and cousin to King James. London: Eyre & Spottiswoode.
  34. ^ Elizabeth I and James VI and I Archived 14 December 2006 at the Wayback Machine, History in Focus Archived 8 September 2011 at the Wayback Machine.
  35. ^ Boas (1953), pp. 101ff.
  36. ^ Kuriyama (2002), p. xvi.
  37. ^ For a full transcript, see Peter Farey's Marlowe page Archived 4 March 2016 at the Wayback Machine (Retrieved 30 April 2015).
  38. ^ Nicholl (1992), pp. 246–248.
  39. ^ Stanley, Thomas (1687). The History of Philosophy 1655–61. quoted in Oxford English Dictionary.
  40. ^ Riggs, David (2005). The World of Christopher Marlowe (1st American ed.). Henry Holt and Co. p. 294. ISBN 978-0805077551. Archived from the original on 28 February 2022. Retrieved 3 November 2015.
  41. ^ Riggs (2004), p. 38.
  42. ^ For a full transcript, see Peter Farey's Marlowe page Archived 4 March 2016 at the Wayback Machine (Retrieved 30 April 2012).
  43. ^ "The 'Baines Note'". Archived from the original on 4 March 2016. Retrieved 30 April 2015.
  44. ^ a b For a full transcript of Kyd's letter, see Peter Farey's Marlowe page Archived 22 June 2015 at the Wayback Machine (Retrieved 30 April 2015).
  45. ^ For a full transcript, see Peter Farey's Marlowe page Archived 25 January 2016 at the Wayback Machine. (Retrieved 30 April 2015)
  46. ^ Waith, Eugene. The Herculean Hero in Marlowe, Chapman, Shakespeare, and Dryden. Chatto and Windus, London, 1962. The idea is commonplace, though by no means universally accepted.
  47. ^ Smith, Bruce R. (1995). Homosexual desire in Shakespeare's England. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. p. 74. ISBN 978-0-226-76366-8.
  48. ^ Bevington, David, and Eric Rasmussen, eds. Doctor Faustus and Other Plays. Oxford English Drama. Oxford University Press, 1998, pp. viii–ix. ISBN 0-19-283445-2
  49. ^ White, Paul Whitfield, ed. (1998). Marlowe, History and Sexuality: New Critical Essays on Christopher Marlowe. New York: AMS Press. ISBN 978-0-404-62335-7.
  50. ^ Christopher Marlowe (1885). "Hero and Leander". In A. H. Bullen (ed.). The works of Christopher Marlowe. Vol. 3. London: John C. Nimmo. pp. 88, 157–193. Archived from the original on 21 September 2008. Retrieved 21 May 2009 – via Project Gutenberg.
  51. ^ Simon Barker, Hilary Hinds (2003). The Routledge Anthology of Renaissance Drama. Routledge. ISBN 9780415187343. Archived from the original on 29 December 2019. Retrieved 9 February 2013.
  52. ^ Marlowe, Christopher; Forker, Charles R. (1995). Edward the Second. Manchester University Press. ISBN 9780719030895. Archived from the original on 21 May 2016. Retrieved 4 November 2015.
  53. ^ Williams, Deanne (2006). "Dido, Queen of England". ELH. 73 (1): 31–59. doi:10.1353/elh.2006.0010. JSTOR 30030002. S2CID 153554373.
  54. ^ For a full transcript, see Peter Farey's Marlowe page Archived 22 June 2015 at the Wayback Machine (Retrieved 31 March 2012).
  55. ^ a b Mulryne, J. R. "Thomas Kyd."Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004.(subscription required) Archived 4 September 2022 at the Wayback Machine
  56. ^ Haynes, Alan. The Elizabethan Secret Service. London: Sutton, 2005.
  57. ^ National Archives, Acts of the Privy Council. Meetings of the Privy Council, including details of those attending, are recorded and minuted for 16, 23, 25, 29 and the morning of 31 May 1593 , all of them taking place in the Star Chamber at Westminster. There is no record of any meeting on either 18 or 20 May 1593, however, just a note of the warrant being issued on 18 May 1593 and the fact that Marlowe "entered his appearance for his indemnity therein" on the 20th.
  58. ^ Palladis Tamia. London, 1598: 286v–287r.
  59. ^ Kuriyama (2002), pp. 102–103, 135, 156; Honan (2005), p. 355.
  60. ^ Hotson (1925), p. 65.
  61. ^ Honan (2005), p. 325.
  62. ^ Wilson, Scott. Resting Places: The Burial Sites of More Than 14,000 Famous Persons, 3d ed.: 2 (Kindle Location 30125). McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers.
  63. ^ Hotson (1925), pp. 39–40.
  64. ^ a b de Kalb, Eugénie (May 1925). "The Death of Marlowe", in The Times Literary Supplement
  65. ^ Tannenbaum (1926), pp. 41–42.
  66. ^ Bakeless, John (1942). The Tragicall History of Christopher Marlowe, p. 182
  67. ^ Honan (2005), p. 354.
  68. ^ Nicholl, Charles (2004). "Marlowe [Marley], Christopher", Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press. online edn, January 2008. Retrieved 24 August 2013. "The authenticity of the inquest is not in doubt, but whether it tells the full truth is another matter. The nature of Marlowe's companions raises questions about their reliability as witnesses."
  69. ^ Boas (1953), p. 293.
  70. ^ Nicholl (2002), p. 38.
  71. ^ Nicholl (2002), pp. 29–30.
  72. ^ Kuriyama (2002), p. 136.
  73. ^ Downie, J. A. "Marlowe, facts and fictions". In Downie & Parnell (2000), pp. 26–27.
  74. ^ Tannenbaum (1926), p. [page needed].
  75. ^ Nicholl (2002), p. 415.
  76. ^ Breight, Curtis C. (1996). Surveillance, Militarism and Drama in the Elizabethan Era, p. 114
  77. ^ Hammer, Paul E. J. (1996) "A Reckoning Reframed: the 'Murder' of Christopher Marlowe Revisited", in English Literary Renaissance, pp. 225–242
  78. ^ Trow, M. J. (2001). Who Killed Kit Marlowe? A contract to murder in Elizabethan England, p. 250
  79. ^ Riggs, David (2004a). The World of Christopher Marlowe. Faber. pp. 334–337. ISBN 978-0-571-22159-2.
  80. ^ Honan (2005), p. 348.
  81. ^ Honan (2005), p. 355.
  82. ^ Nicholl, Charles (2008). "Marlowe [Marley], Christopher (bap. 1564, . 1593), playwright and poet". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press.
  83. ^ Peter Alexander ed., William Shakespeare: The Complete Works (London 1962) p. 273
  84. ^ Wilson, Richard (2008). "Worthies away: the scene begins to cloud in Shakespeare's Navarre". In Mayer, Jean-Christophe (ed.). Representing France and the French in early modern English drama. Newark: University of Delaware Press. pp. 95–97. ISBN 978-0-87413-000-3.
  85. ^ Kathman, David (2003), "The Question of Authorship", in Wells, Stanley; Orlin, Lena C., Shakespeare: an Oxford Guide, Oxford University Press, pp. 620–632, ISBN 978-0-19-924522-2
  86. ^ a b "The Sixteenth Century: Topics". The Norton Anthology of English Literature. W.W. Norton and Company. Archived from the original on 10 October 2011. Retrieved 10 December 2011. See especially the middle section in which the author shows how another Cambridge graduate, Thomas Preston makes his title character express his love in a popular play written around 1560 and compares that "clumsy" line with Doctor Faustus addressing Helen of Troy{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: postscript (link)
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  88. ^ Cheney (2004a), p. xvi.
  89. ^ a b Cheney (2004a), pp. xviii, xix.
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  94. ^ Cheney (2004b), p. 5.
  95. ^ Logan, Terence P., and Denzell S. Smith, eds. The Predecessors of Shakespeare: A Survey and Bibliography of Recent Studies in English Renaissance Drama. Lincoln, NE: University of Nebraska Press, 1973.
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Further reading

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  • Bevington, David, and Eric Rasmussen, eds. Doctor Faustus and Other Plays. Oxford English Drama. Oxford University Press, 1998. ISBN 0-19-283445-2
  • Conrad, B. Der wahre Shakespeare: Christopher Marlowe. (German non-Fiction book) 5th Edition, 2016. ISBN 978-3957800022
  • Cornelius R. M. Christopher Marlowe's Use of the Bibleu. New York: P. Lang, 1984.
  • Marlowe, Christopher. Complete Works. Vol. 3: Edward II., ed. R. Rowland. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1994. (pp. xxii–xxiii)
  • Oz, Avraham, ed. Marlowe. New Casebooks. Houndmills, Basingstoke and London: Palgrave/Macmillan, 2003. ISBN 033362498X
  • Parker, John. The Aesthetics of Antichrist: From Christian Drama to Christopher Marlowe. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2007. ISBN 978-0-8014-4519-4
  • Shepard, Alan. Marlowe's Soldiers: Rhetorics of Masculinity in the Age of the Armada, Ashgate, 2002. ISBN 0-7546-0229-X
  • Sim, James H. Dramatic Uses of Biblical Allusions in Marlowe and Shakespeare, Gainesville: University of Florida Press, 1966.
  • Swinburne, Algernon Charles (1883). "Marlowe, Christopher" . Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. XV (9th ed.). pp. 556–558.
  • Wraight A. D.; Stern, Virginia F. In Search of Christopher Marlowe: A Pictorial Biography, London: Macdonald, 1965.
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